Palestinian suicide bombers kill two
The terror group Hamas claimed responsibility for the suicide bombing at the Ariel settlement its first open violation of the ceasefire it signed six weeks ago.
A renegade faction of Yasser Arafat's Fatah movement said it carried out the shopping centre attack. Both bombers were 17, the militant groups said.
Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon warned there was no prospect of moving forwards with the US road map to peace "if terrorism does not cease completely".
His Palestinian counterpart, Mahmoud Abbas, cut short a tour of the Gulf states to fly home early from Qatar. Neither side wants to be seen to be responsible for wrecking President Bush's ambitious plan, which calls for an end to the violence and a Palestinian state by 2005.
Hamas said it had carried out the bombing to avenge the "assassination" of two of its members by Israeli troops last week, but would now go back to observing the truce.
An Israeli military source said there would be no large scale retaliation. He said it appeared the attacks less than an hour apart were not co-ordinated.
Avigail Josef was selling lottery tickets near the supermarket in Rosh Ha'ayin where the first suicide bombing took place.
"I saw fire and a cloud of smoke. They brought out an injured child and then his mother," she said. Inside the supermarket door lay the bomber's legless torso.
The bomber and a bystander were killed, and nine Israelis wounded.
The Fatah-linked Al Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades said it carried out the attack.
"We swear there will be more martyrdom operations until the occupation is defeated," a spokesman said by telephone. A short time later, the other teenage bomber blew himself up at a bus stop near the entrance to Ariel, killing an 18-year-old Israeli army recruit and seriously injuring two others.
The Hamas military wing Izzedine al Qassam said the Ariel attack was in revenge for the killing of two of the group's top bombmakers in an Israeli army raid near Nablus in the West Bank last week.
A Hamas political leader in Gaza, Ismail Hanieh, suggested now the score had been settled in Hamas' view, they would return to the ceasefire.
Asked whether Hamas was calling off the truce, he said: "No, this is a reaction to the continuous violation of the truce by Israel."
Both bombers were 17, one from Nablus and the other from the nearby Askar refugee camp. They lived just a few blocks apart, but their families said they did not know each other.
Hamas originally said the Ariel bomber was 21, but later said he was 17. Israel sealed off Nablus and imposed a curfew on surrounding villages after the blast. It also called off the planned release of 76 Palestinian prisoners, none of them involved in anti-Israeli violence, who were to have been freed today.
Sharon accused the Palestinian Authority of ducking its obligation to dismantle the violent militant groups.
The Palestinian leadership said it was committed to the road map and would not allow truce violations, but did not explain how it intended to stop attacks.
It said it had "always condemned targeting civilians", but held Israel responsible for "the security deterioration in the region".
Israeli officials said the attacks underscored the need to complete a security barrier between Israel and the West Bank. The United States has criticised the barrier, which cuts through West Bank land.
Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Jonathan Peled said the first stage of the fence to be completed stopped just short of the site of the Rosh Ha'ayin attack.
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