Israel's Sharon Keeps Up Pressure

Israeli troops killed four Palestinians, one of them armed, in arrest raids in the West Bank on Friday, the army said, as Israel's vice premier warned of dire consequences for the country if the ruling Likud party rejects a plan to withdraw from the Gaza Strip.

Meanwhile, the gap is narrowing in an upcoming referendum in Israel on Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's plan for a unilateral withdrawal from the Gaza Strip, reports CBS News Correspondent Robert Berger. Sharon's hawkish Likud party will hold a referendum on the Gaza withdrawal plan on May 2, and the latest poll shows 49 percent supporting it with 39 percent opposed.

What's significant, reports Berger, is that 9 percent of the voters said they changed their minds in recent days and decide to vote against the plan. Whatever the outcome, Sharon's decision to dismantle 21 Gaza settlements has left Israel's biggest political party deeply divided.

Sharon initially said the May 2 vote among 200,000 party members would be binding, but has since backtracked, saying it would not have legal weight.

In the West Bank, Israeli troops searching for Palestinian militants raided the town of Qalqiliya and a village near the town of Nablus.

In Qalqiliya, Israeli undercover troops entered town in a civilian car and a refrigerator truck and opened fire from close range on a group of eight men standing outside a house, witnesses said. Troops killed three men and seriously wounded a fourth man, Attef Shaaban, the local head of the Al Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades, a militant group with ties to Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat's Fatah party.

Witnesses said one of the dead men was Shaaban's deputy. The other two, while Fatah members, were not militants, they said.

The army said all the dead were wanted militants who were shot when they refused to heed calls to stop and warning shots. It was not clear whether the four were armed.

In the village of Talouza, troops backed by a helicopter gunship came to arrest four wanted militants, the army said. Two of the wanted men opened fire, drawing return fire that killed one man and wounded another. Palestinians said the man killed in the incident was a bystander.

In Israel, Sharon's allies sounded warnings about what would happen to the country if the Likud rejects the Gaza withdrawal plan in its referendum.

"There will be dire consequences for the state of Israel, politically, security-wise and economically, this I have no doubt about," Vice Premier Ehud Olmert told Israel Radio.

Sharon's plan, which also includes completion of a West Bank barrier, a withdrawal from four small West Bank settlements and the expansion of five West Bank settlement blocs, appeared to be gaining momentum after endorsements of U.S. President George W. Bush and several key Likud ministers.

But while senior Likud ministers have grudgingly endorsed the plan, they have not actively campaigned for it and Olmert railed against them for their halfhearted support.

"I am disturbed by the fact that we are not putting the full effort into encouraging Likud members to support the prime minister and his plan," Olmert told the radio.

"As soon as a person makes a decision, he has to stand behind that decision completely, because the prime minister can't be left to fight it alone," he said.

On Thursday Sharon told his party that a rejection of the plan would also mean a loss of the U.S. support that he won in his recent trip to Washington.

But Sharon also indicated that he would still bring the plan to the Cabinet and parliament — even if he loses the vote.

Also Friday, Jerusalem police barred Muslim men under the age of 45 from attending prayers at a disputed holy site after receiving warnings that youths planned to riot.

The Al Aqsa Mosque compound, known to Jews as the Temple Mount, has been a frequent flashpoint since the outbreak of Israeli-Palestinian fighting in September 2000.

The sponsors of the road map to peace between the Israelis and Palestinians will meet in New York on May 4 to try to give new impetus to the stalled plan, the European Union's foreign policy chief said Thursday.

The road map drafted by the so-called Quartet — the EU, the United States, the United Nations and Russia — has been sidelined by Israel's unilateral decision to withdraw from Gaza and parts of the West Bank, which the Palestinians claim is a move to redraw borders.

Solana told reporters after meeting Secretary-General Kofi Annan that he hopes next month's Quartet meeting will clarify a lot of issues and "give a new impulse to the peace process."

"We are going to have an exchange of views with the Arab world before the Quartet (meeting) ... to get a good outcome that will recuperate trust among the Palestinian people and the Arab world and recuperate also a new momentum for the peace process in the Middle East," he said.

The World Bank Wednesday said it will not purchase or become temporary custodian of Israeli assets in the Gaza Strip after an Israeli withdrawal, the Jerusalem Post reported.

A high-level World Bank official told the English-language paper the bank is more likely play an economic advisory role, helping the Palestinians manage and productively use the evacuated property.

Israel has suggested it will raze structures it leaves behind, rather than allow them to fall into the hands of terrorists, unless a neutral third-party agrees to take control of the farms, homes and other real state.