Renewed Violence
Clashes Break Out After
Friday Prayers
Oct. 27 - Trouble was expected and trouble came today
as thousands of
worshippers in the West Bank and Gaza poured out of mosques
from
traditional Friday Muslim prayers and headed for the familiar points
of
conflict.
Israeli troops shot dead four Palestinians
in clashes the West Bank
and Gaza, witnesses and medical sources said.
Gun battles between
Palestinians and Israeli troops flared in the West
Bank town of Ramallah
and the sound of machine gun fire rattled the city.
Palestinian hospital officials said 115 Palestinians were injured in
the fighting, 12 of them critically.
The clashes came after a
few days of lull in almost a month of
violence that has claimed the lives
of more than 133 people, all but eight
of them Arabs, shattering the Middle
East peace process. The latest round
of violence came a day after a Palestinian
suicide cyclist of the Islamic
Jihad group blew himself up beside an Israeli
army post in the Gaza Strip,
slightly wounding a soldier and heightening
fears of suicide bombings in
Israel.
The incident led to
calls from some Islamic militant groups for new
suicide attacks in Israel.
"We want a big bomb," about 2,000 Hamas
supporters chanted as
they marched through the West Bank town of Nablus.
Across the West
Bank, Palestinian rock-throwers clashed with Israeli
troops who fired rubber-coated
steel bullets. In the West Bank town of
Ramallah, acrid smoke from a car
burned by the crowd rose into the air as
Israeli troops took aim at rock-throwers
from behind a line of jeeps.
Prepared for the fray, more than the usual
number of Israeli armored
cars were on the spot to confront them. Israeli
tanks squatted on the
hilltops around them. On the Palestinian side, ambulances
were lined up
ready to carry away the wounded.
At the Al-Aqsa
compound - the site that saw the beginning of the latest
round of violence
after Israeli right-wing politician Aron Sharon's
controversial visit Sept.
28 - several thousand worshippers dispersed
quietly after Friday noon prayers.
A Palestinian flag was planted atop the
Dome of the Rock shrine, one of
two mosques in the compound.
The site, called the Haram as-Sharif (Noble
Sanctuary) by Muslims and
the Temple Mount by Jews, is holy to both religions.
Israel had previously barred Palestinian men under the age of 45 from
worshipping at the site to prevent possible clashes. Today, the age
restriction was dropped to 35.
Some Palestinian activists had declared
today a "day of rage," and
asked Muslim worshippers to confront
Israeli troops after noon prayers,
the high point of the Muslim religious
week.
"The only way to respond to Israeli attacks is through military
operations," said Salah Darwazeh, a Hamas leader in Nablus, referring
to
suicide bombings carried out in recent years by the Hamas military wing,
Izzedine al Qassam.
In the Gaza Strip refugee camp of Jebaliya,
more than 10,000 Hamas
supporters attended a rally led by several dozen
masked men wearing
identical white T-shirts with the logo, "The martyrs
of al Qassam."
In the Jewish West Bank settlement of Efrat, the
main synagogue was
vandalized overnight, and settlers said they suspected
Palestinian
intruders. The synagogue was flooded - the vandals had turned
on water
hoses - and swastikas were spray-painted on the walls along with
slogans
in Arabic and Hebrew.
Efrat Mayor Eitan Golan said
security at the settlement, between
Jerusalem and Hebron, must be improved.
"Today they spray paint. Tomorrow
they could spray gunfire,"
he said.
Israel has been on high alert for new suicide attacks since
several dozen
Islamic militants were released from Palestinian jails two
weeks ago.
After Thursday's suicide attack near an Israeli army
base by
24-year-old kindergarten janitor Nabil Araeer, Israeli forces responded
by
destroying a house overlooking the base and uprooting trees that gave
cover to Palestinian attackers.
Araeer's funeral in Gaza
City today attracted thousands of mourners
who chanted "Death to Israel!
Death to America!" as Palestinians in
civilian clothes fired automatic
weapons above their heads.
Official Palestinian television for the
first time covered the
funeral of a suicide bomber from a militant group
opposed to Palestinian
leader Yasser Arafat's interim peace accords with
Israel.
But with peace efforts in trouble, Israeli security officials
warned of an
escalation of the conflict. "The operators are out there,
at large," said
an army spokesman, Col. Raanan Gissin.
Meanwhile, President Clinton said the new outbreak of bloodshed was
"heartbreaking."
Expressing frustration over the persistence
of the violence, Clinton
said Israelis and Palestinians should not lose
sight of the "pretty good
days" of comparative quiet.
The president says he was keeping in close touch with leaders of both
sides to see what can be done to "undermine the causes" of the violence.
This week, Barak has been trying to cobble an emergency national
coalition government with Sharon, who heads the opposition Likud Party.
Most experts believe that if Barak does succeed in convincing Sharon
to form an emergency government, a resumption of the peace talks is
unlikely.
ABCNEWS' Sue Masterman in Vienna, The Associated Press and
Reuters
contributed to this report.
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