OCCUPIED JERUSALEM, 12 November — Israel delayed a troop pullback from positions surrounding two Palestinian-ruled West Bank cities yesterday as two tanks and a bulldozer made an incursion into the northern Gaza Strip.
The tanks also opened fire on a security position in the south, Palestinian security officials said.
The armor rolled into Palestinian land near the town of Beit Hanun, in the northeastern Gaza Strip, flattening farmland, the officials said.
Tanks also opened fire with heavy machine guns on a Palestinian security position to the east of Gaza City, close to the Jewish settlement of Netzarim, the officials said.
Raanan Gissin, a spokesman for Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, confirmed that troops in Palestinian areas near Tulkarm and Jenin would not be pulled back immediately, despite US pressure for a withdrawal.
“As long as there are hot warnings of planned bombings...we have no choice but to remain there to prevent them (the bombers) from leaving,” Gissin said.
The United States has called on Israel to withdraw from Palestinian-ruled areas it reoccupied in October after the assassination of a Cabinet minister.
Israel’s Cabinet said yesterday the army would delay the pullout from the remaining two cities “due to the severe warnings and the fact that the Palestinian Authority isn’t taking preventive steps (against fighters)”.
In Bethlehem, a Palestinian man was killed when an explosion ripped through his metal workshop in a village yesterday, Palestinian security officials said.
Omar Abu Zeid, 28, thought to be a member of Islamic Jihad, was killed in the blast.
Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, speaking at the UN General Assembly yesterday, called on the United Nations to send observers to protect the Palestinian people “from occupation, terror and ethnic cleansing practised by Israel.”
Arafat thanked US President George W. Bush for his statement in favor of a Palestinian state and pledged to work to resume the peace process.
He said: “From our side we will exert every possible effort to achieve these objectives.”
Bush’s statement was “a significant step in the path of ending the conflict and the establishment of peace in the Middle East,” Arafat said.
He called on Israel to “immediately resume” negotiations on the future and permanent status of the Palestinian territories, which were broken off at the start of the Palestinian uprising in late September last year.
International observers would help “consolidate the cease-fire” in the uprising, he said, noting: “It is very evident that we are in need of more international efforts and international presence on the ground.”
Earlier Sunday, Arafat held private talks with UN Secretary General Kofi Annan on the sidelines of the week-long debate.
