Israeli troops fire rubber bullets at wall protesters

ISRAELI soldiers fired rubber bullets yesterday at protesters who approached the disputed security fence the state is building around — and in some places through — Palestinian areas. A protest group said 11 demonstrators were injured.

Also yesterday, hundreds of Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails refused food, a day after a prison riot left 20 prisoners and five guards injured.

Separate White House summits with Israeli and Palestinian leaders in the past week have failed to energise halting peace moves.

The fence and the release of Palestinian prisoners by Israel have emerged as major issues of contention, though neither is mentioned in the US-backed "road map" peace plan that aims to end the fighting and lead to Palestinian statehood by 2005.

The pro-Palestinian International Solidarity Movement said soldiers fired rubber bullets at about 300 Palestinians and 60 foreign supporters, who dismantled a barbed-wire barrier in front of a section of the security fence near Tulkarem in the northern West Bank. The group said three Palestinians and eight foreigners were injured.

The barrier 370-mile series of electric fences, trenches, concrete and coils of razor wire is designed to stop Palestinian bombers and gunmen entering Israel. It has infuriated Palestinians, because it cuts into their territory, isolating towns and villages.

Since the main Palestinian militant groups declared a truce on June 29, Palestinians have demanded that Israel release most of its approximately 7,700 Palestinian prisoners. Israel has offered to free a few hundred, including dozens from the militant groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad.

But no militants have yet been freed, and Palestinian anger is growing over that issue and slow progress in other areas of the road map.

Also yesterday, the Israeli army said it arrested eight militants overnight across the West Bank. One militant was shot and injured by soldiers after he drew a pistol, the military said.