Israelis blamed as West Bank blast kills six

An explosion ripped through a shack in the West Bank today, killing six Palestinian activists in Yasser Arafat’s Fatah movement in one of the deadliest single episodes in 10 months of Mideast violence.

Later, in the Gaza Strip, Israeli helicopters fired rockets at Palestinian police headquarters in Gaza City, wounding two policemen and sending white smoke rising from the compound as people ran frantically from the buildings into the street.

The Israeli military said the compound was used for manufacturing weapons and mortar rounds.

Jewish settlements in Gaza have come under frequent mortar attack, and the Israelis have repeatedly criticised Arafat, the Palestinian leader, for failing to prevent the attacks.

The police compound is near Arafat’s seaside offices, though he was out of the region at the time.

The West Bank blast destroyed a car parts store - a roadside tin shack outside the town of Nablus - and came only hours after a tense confrontation between Israeli police and Palestinians at Jerusalem’s most contested religious shrine.

Palestinians called the pre-dawn blast part of Israel’s efforts to kill suspected militants.

‘‘The Israeli Government continues its policy of assassination,’’ said Palestinian Cabinet Secretary Ahmed Abdel Rahman. ‘‘This policy will destroy any hope for peace. Resistance will continue.’’

But Israel’s Deputy Defence Minister Dalia Rabin-Pelossof called the explosion a ‘‘work accident,’’ Israel’s euphemism for a Palestinian-made bomb that goes off prematurely.

‘‘This is not the first time that the Palestinians have accused Israel of assassinations when explosions like this occurred,’’ she told army radio.

Israeli security sources said three of the Palestinians were wanted by Israel.

They were believed to be involved two bomb attacks in recent months, the sources said.

The force of the blast blew the roof off the shack, and it was badly burned inside, suggesting the explosion came from within the structure.

Palestinian witnesses said they did not hear helicopters or tank guns - signals of earlier Israeli attacks.

The store sits among rows of rusting cars that have been abandoned, near the al-Fara refugee camp.

The bodies were dismembered by the explosion, and some body parts were tossed 30 yards from a table where the men had been sitting on old car seats, he said.

Playing cards, which were apparently in use at the time, were smeared with blood.

All six of the dead were members of Fatah, and regularly slept in the shack, fearing the Israelis would attack them in their homes, Palestinian witnesses said. A seventh man in the shack was seriously wounded.

The violence followed a tense Sunday in Jerusalem, where Palestinians rained stones on Jewish worshippers commemorating a holy day at the Western Wall, prompting Israeli police to storm a mosque and drive back the crowd with stun grenades.

When the stonethrowing began, about 400 Israeli police in riot gear rushed inside the mosque compound.

The police were met with a hail of rocks, and tossed stun grenades.

Fifteen Israeli policemen and 10 Palestinians were injured and 28 Palestinians were arrested.

Israel claims sovereignty over the compound, which Jews call the Temple Mount. However, the Waqf, an Islamic trust, has day-to-day control over what Muslims call the Noble Sanctuary.

The first clashes in the current violence broke out at the site Sept 29 the day after a controversial visit by Ariel Sharon, Israel’s prime minister, who was opposition leader at the time.

Since then, 539 Palestinians and 133 Israelis have died in the fighting.