Israeli police officer killed in West Bank

An Israeli police officer was killed and two others were wounded today as gunmen opened fire at a police vehicle in the West Bank.

Police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said the officer died of a chest wound after the attack near Hebron. He added that police are treating the incident as an attack by Palestinian militants, and officers are searching the area for suspects.

Israel’s emergency services said they treated three people at the scene – one of whom died later in a Jerusalem hospital.

Israeli vehicles have been targeted frequently by Palestinian militants in West Bank drive-by shootings, but such attacks have diminished considerably in recent years.

Thanks to the relative calm and increased security co-ordination with the Palestinians, Israel has considerably eased travel restrictions in the West Bank.

The last fatal West Bank shooting attack took place in December, when a 40-year-old rabbi was shot in the head. Last March, two police officers were killed in a shooting in the Jordan Valley. Their killers have never been caught.

Meanwhile, EU officials said today that there are indications Israel may agree to relax its blockade of Gaza by opening at least one border crossing to large-scale commercial traffic.

EU diplomats said Israel could drop its restrictive list of goods permitted into the region, which has left the territory’s 1.5 million Palestinians mired in poverty.

Instead, there would be a short agreed list of items banned because of Israeli security concerns, the diplomats said.

One source said that while no final decisions have been made, there were positive indications that Israel might be willing to open either the Karni or the Kerem Shalom border crossings for large-scale imports into Gaza.

The Karni and Kerem Shalom crossings have been open for humanitarian goods for the past few years.

Israeli security officials have said talks are under way to replace Israeli supervision with an international presence, with the involvement of the Palestinians and the Egyptians.

The European Union has reacted strongly to the May 31 Israeli commando raid that resulted in the deaths of nine Turkish activists.

The 27-nation bloc has been pressing Israel to ease its three-year old blockade, which EU foreign ministers described as “unacceptable and counterproductive”.

International mediator Tony Blair will brief EU foreign ministers at a summit beginning on Thursday.

Spain, which holds the rotating EU chairmanship, said it will propose the bloc exerts strong diplomatic pressure on Israel to end the closure.