Israeli troops kill two Palestinian attackers

Israeli troops killed two armed Palestinians disguised as Israeli soldiers today as they tried to infiltrate a Jewish settlement in the Gaza Strip. A third attacker managed to escape.

The Al Aqsa Martyr’s Brigade, a militia linked to Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat’s Fatah movement, claimed responsibility for the foiled assault.

The violence threatened an agreement to turn security in Gaza over to the Palestinians as a trial for easing harsh Israeli restrictions in the West Bank.

The militant Hamas and Islamic Jihad groups have refused to go along with the deal. The Palestinian security chief, Interior Minister Abdel Razak Yehiyeh, failed to get the groups to soften their opposition in talks late yesterday.

Under the agreement, Israel turned over security duties to Palestinian forces in the West Bank town of Bethlehem this week and was to take similar steps in Gaza.

Israel says that if the Palestinians can stop attacks in those two places, they will ease restrictions in other parts of the West Bank.

But in Gaza, there was no sign of reduced violence or easing of Israeli restrictions, despite the deal.

Just before dawn today, three Palestinians dressed in Israeli uniforms and armed with assault rifles and grenades tried to infiltrate the Jewish settlement of Kfar Darom in central Gaza, the military said.

Soldiers shot dead one man at the settlement fence and chased another into a building in a nearby Palestinian town, killing him there. Israeli media said soldiers were hunting for the third man.

Elsewhere, in the West Bank town of Tulkarem, Israeli forces destroyed the house of Mohannad Shraim, a Hamas leader. He has been in Israeli custody since April.

The Israeli military said he was one of the planners of a suicide bombing in the coastal city of Netanya, which killed 29 people gathered for a holiday meal on March 27.