Israel in dawn raid on city

IN THE biggest sweep of its kind for months, Israeli troops hunting for militants stormed dozens of homes in this Palestinian city yesterday, ordering residents to line up in the dawn chill as tanks blocked roads and helicopters hovered above.

Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat denounced the raid as a new war crime. It came two days after five Israelis were killed in a shooting rampage in a farming community.

The Palestinian leader also responded angrily to Israeli Foreign Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s pledge that, if elected prime minister, he would expel him. “Netanyahu has to remember I am Yasser Arafat and this is my land and the land of my great-great-grandfathers,” he said.

The escalation came as Palestinian negotiators met with US envoy David Satterfield, who is seeking comments on a new peace plan calling for Palestinian reforms, an Israeli troop pullback and a provisional Palestinian state by 2003.

Palestinian officials denied Israeli reports the US agreed to put the plan on hold until after Israeli elections on January 28. Israeli officials have said the plan does not meet Israeli security concerns and is unacceptable in its present form.

“Contrary to what the Israelis are saying, Mr Satterfield informed us the American administration will complete work on the road map and declare it by the middle of next month,” said Palestinian Cabinet minister Saeb Erekat.

The Nablus raid was triggered by a weekend shooting attack on Kibbutz Metzer, an Israeli communal farm, by a gunman from the Al Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigade, a militia linked to Palestinian leader Arafat’s Fatah group.

The gunman fled the scene after killing five people, including a mother and her two young sons.

Israeli security sources, speaking on condition of anonymity, on Wednesday identified the suspected gunman as Sirhan Sirhan and said he is a distant relative of the assassin by the same name who killed Senator Robert Kennedy in 1968.

Sirhan Sirhan, the suspect in the kibbutz attack, is a 19-year-old from the Tulkarem refugee camp. Relatives said Israeli troops searched their homes and detained two of his uncles in a raid earlier this week.

Israeli security officials have said the order for the attack came from militiamen in Nablus.

IIn the Nablus raid, hundreds of soldiers backed by about 100 armoured vehicles and helicopter gunships poured into the city before dawn yesterday. It was the biggest sweep in the city since Israel’s Defensive Shield offensive in April, and military commentators said they expected the operation to go on for many days.

Israel declared Nablus a closed military zone, and soldiers barred journalists from taking pictures or talking to those rounded up.

Arafat said the Nablus operation “is a new war crime against our people.”

Troops also swept into Bir Zeit, a university town north of Ramallah, arresting suspected militants and confining residents to their homes.

Arafat’s Fatah faction was trying to persuade the militant Hamas group to stop suicide attacks in Israel. However, Hamas hinted on Tuesday, after talks with Fatah in Cairo, it would not agree to the demand.