Israeli police forces were on high alert for in the north of the country on Wednesday, mainly in the Wadi Ara area and Beit She'an, due to intelligence that Palestinian activists were about to enter Israel to carry out bombing attacks, Israel Radio reported Wednesday.
Road blocks were erected on main roads in the area, an a major road was closed to traffic as police beefed up its forces in the region, the radio said.
Earlier, an Israeli officer was moderately wounded late Tuesday night in the Gaza Strip. The officer was the commander of a tank in which a technical fault was discovered south of the Kfar Darom settlement. When he existed the tank to fix the fault, Palestinians fired at him and he was hit in the lower part of his body.
In the West Bank, occupation troops abducted 30 Palestinians Tuesday night, 17 of them Islamic Jihad members, who were arrested near Jenin, Israeli military sources said.
Meanwhile, the death toll of the massive Israeli raid on the city of Ramallah last Monday, increased to five Palestinians, including a child.
Palestinian medical sources said that a fourth body of a local leader of Hamas was exhumed from under the rubble of a building torn down by the occupying forces during its invasion. The fourth body was later identified as Hasanein Rommana, 37, from ElBireh.
"Rommana's body arrived at the hospital with severe bone fractures and crushed parts, a thing that clearly indicates that he was crushed to death when the building was demolished," Dr. Aref Jamal, a doctor at Ramallah public hospital said.
On the political front, US Secretary of State Colin Powell rebuffed Israeli criticism about his intentions to meet later this week organizers of an unofficial Mideast peace treaty.
Powell said he would go ahead with a meeting the Geneva Accord's architects. The meeting would not contradict the U.S. commitment to the "road map" outlining the establishment of a Palestinian state, he said.
"I don't know why I or anyone else in the U.S. government should deny ourselves the opportunity to hear from others and who have ideas with respect to peace," Powell said Tuesday during a visit to Tunisia.
He added that the meeting "in no way undercuts our strong support" for Israel and the road map. Israeli Vice Premier Ehud Olmert said Tuesday that Powell would be "making a mistake" by meeting the plan's organizers, led by former Israeli Cabinet minister Yossi Beilin and Palestinian minister Yasser Abed Rabbo.
For its part, the White House said Wednesday that President Bush's plan for peace in the Middle East is the best formula, but left the door open for Powell to meet with those who drafted an alternate plan.
"The secretary of state will make determinations about who he meets with," presidential spokesman Scott McClellan said.
"The path forward toward peace in the Middle East is the road map," McClellan said. He said other approaches could be useful but he declined to say whether the informal agreement was in that category. He said that was a judgment for others to make. (Albawaba.com)
© 2003 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
