Palestinian Kills 3 Israeli Students

A Palestinian infiltrator shot and killed three Israeli students at an Orthodox Jewish high school in the West Bank settlement of Itamar, near the Palestinian city of Nablus, settlers and rescue service officials said. The attacker was shot and killed.

Hezi Katoa, a rescue service worker, told Israel Radio that three students were killed and another wounded by gunfire.

"We found one wounded student who had been hit by a number of bullets in the chest. An army doctor pronounced him dead," he said. "We heard about two other students wounded in the school compound. When we got there we found two of them lying behind the building with bullet wounds all over their bodies. All our efforts to revive them failed."

Settlers said the attacker entered the settlement and opened fire near the high school, where teen-agers study and live before entering the Israeli army. The rabbi who heads the school said the students came from all over the country.

Meanwhile, Israeli troops swept through Jenin and made more arrests in Bethlehem following almost daily suicide bomb attacks claimed by a militia linked to Yasser Arafat. A top Israeli official said Tuesday's moves in the West Bank do not portend another full-scale assault on Palestinian strongholds.

Israeli soldiers also entered Beitunia, a suburb of the West Bank town of Ramallah, and surrounded the house of a Hamas leader, Palestinians said. However, the leader, Hassan Yussuf, was not there. The Israeli military had no comment.

A Palestinian man was shot in the leg and bled to death in Jenin, witnesses said. Also, an Israeli motorist was killed and another wounded in a shooting attack, apparently by Palestinian militants, near the Jewish settlement of Ofra, rescue services spokesman Yeruham Mandola said.

The renewed bloodshed comes as the Bush administration is launching a new effort to start peace talks between Israel and the Palestinian Authority. President Bush was sending envoy William Burns to the Middle East on Tuesday night with CIA director George J. Tenet likely to follow this weekend.

Burns will survey the region, seeking the views of Egyptian, Saudi Arabian and Jordanian officials as well as those of Israel and the Palestinians, while Tenet intends to focus on revamping security arrangements on the West Bank and in Gaza.

In other diplomatic activity, Russian envoy Andrei Vdovin met with Arafat in Ramallah and called for an end to "these terrorist attacks." He also called for an international peace conference.

In an attempt to extend its ability to monitor military developments in the region, Israel launched a sophisticated spy satellite Tuesday — a clear demonstration of its advanced missile capabilities.

Defense Ministry spokesman Yarden Vatikay confirmed that the Ofek-5 satellite had been sent into space from Israel's launching facility at the Palmahim air force base on the coast, south of Tel Aviv, but refused to say if it had reached its planned orbit. Israel's last successful spy satellite, the Ofek-3, burned up in the atmosphere about a year ago.

Israel's latest sweep in the West Bank came after a Palestinian blew himself up outside an ice cream parlor and cafe crowded with women and children in a Tel Aviv suburb Monday, killing Ruth Peled, 56, and her 18-month-old granddaughter, Sinai Kenaan.

The Al Aqsa Brigades, linked to Arafat's Fatah movement, claimed responsibility and identified the bomber as Jihad Titi, 18, a cousin of a leading Al Aqsa militant, Mahmoud Titi, who was killed in an Israeli tank attack last week.

Troops in armored personnel carriers and jeeps drove into Jenin and a nearby refugee camp at about 3 a.m. and left by midday. They arrested eight Palestinians, including Rami Awad, local leader of the Islamic militant group Hamas. Soldiers also searched an Islamic school, seizing computer disks, residents said.

There were heavy exchanges of fire with Palestinian gunmen.

In one incident, a 55-year-old Palestinian civilian, who had come out of his home to watch the fighting, bled to death after he was shot in the leg by Israeli soldiers, witnesses said. Israeli troops opened fire on an ambulance trying to retrieve the wounded man, witnesses said; the army said it was checking that report.

"We couldn't bring him to the hospital until 8 a.m. and by then he was already dead," said Ibrahim Dabaneh, director of emergency services in the city.

In one deserted neighborhood, the sound of a Palestinian gunman's Kalashnikov assault rifle echoed through the streets as Israeli armored vehicles fired heavy-caliber mounted machine guns toward the source of the fire, and soldiers dashed across open ground toward the cover of an empty building.

In its stairwell, about a dozen soldiers lay down and went to asleep. They had been up all night, waiting for orders to enter Jenin. The refugee camp in Jenin was the scene of some of the bloodiest battles in Israel's six-week West Bank offensive, Operation Defensive Shield, which ended earlier this month.

In Bethlehem to the south, Israeli forces combed the town for the third straight day Tuesday, blocking off the Church of the Nativity to prevent gunmen from taking refuge there. During the earlier offensive, several dozen gunmen ran into the church ahead of Israeli forces, setting off a 39-day standoff that ended with the deportation of 13 militants.

On Tuesday, Israeli forces arrested four Palestinians and discovered a bomb and some weapons in the Dheisheh refugee camp next to Bethlehem, Palestinian security officials said.

The Israeli incursions have become an almost nightly occurrence. With the exception of the extended operation in Bethlehem, they usually last a few hours and result in the arrest of suspected militants.

Deputy Defense Minister Dalia Rabin-Pelossof admitted Tuesday that despite the arrest of thousands of suspected militants and the killing of dozens of wanted men, Operation Defensive Shield did not succeed in ending the militants' ability to stage attacks.

"We know now that there is nothing easier than to take a person bent on suicide and attach a bomb to him," she told Israel TV.

She denied that the Israeli military's frequent incursions into Palestinian territory are a precursor of another full-scale operation.

And she said the defense establishment has a plan for a security fence between Israel and the West Bank and that "there should be a fence in the most sensitive parts (of the border) in a matter of weeks."

The border between Israel and the West Bank is largely open to infiltration, and Israel has avoided erecting physical obstacles for fear this might weaken its claim to at least some of the territory before a negotiated settlement. A fence would also leave many Jewish settlers on the other side from Israel.