OCCUPIED JERUSALEM, 24 October 2003 — Defying a US-backed peace road map, Israel yesterday issued building tenders for over 300 new homes in two Jewish settlements while the army said it was ready to “remove” Palestinian President Yasser Arafat.

A Housing Ministry official said tenders had been issued for 143 new apartments in the Karnei Shomron settlement, near Nablus in the northern West Bank, and 180 in Givat Zeev, which is close to Jerusalem.

The Israeli group Peace Now said the government had now published 1,627 tenders for new homes in the settlements since the beginning of the year.

The road map accepted by Israel and the Palestinians in efforts to end more than three years of violence freezes all “settlement activity”, meaning construction work.

But a senior Israeli official said: “All legal tenders within existing communities are not included in the road map according to our interpretation and our understanding.”

The building plans were published a day after Israel vowed to continue building a barrier that cuts into the West Bank despite a United Nations resolution demanding it be torn down.

Israel says the barrier is needed to keep out bombers, but Palestinians say it grabs land they want as part of an independent state.

“We call on the United States to intervene to stop the Israeli government continuing settlement activities and walls. Settlements and walls are the number one obstacle to peace,” said chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat.

Israel has about 150 settlements in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, territories it occupied in the 1967 Middle East war. The international community regards settlements on occupied land as illegal under international law.

The Jerusalem Post, meanwhile, cited a senior military source as saying the Israeli Army was ready to “remove” Arafat if the government gave the order.

The report in the right-wing daily, which recently editorialized in favor of killing Arafat, followed a decision in principle by Israel’s security Cabinet last month to “remove” the Palestinian leader. The ministers did not say how or when.

The threat against Arafat sparked worldwide outcry and drew cautions from Israel’s key ally Washington as it struggles to revive the road map.

“We have presented plans showing the risks and the chances of the operation itself, including the options to remove him alive or not,” the Post quoted the military source as saying.

“The government has to make a decision to allow the army to act. The army is ready,” the source was quoted as saying. The Post did not provide further details. The army declined comment.

Arafat has been confined to his West Bank compound in Ramallah for much of the past two years, accused by Israel and the United States of fomenting violence in a Palestinian uprising for independence that erupted in September 2000. He denies it.

Meanwhile, gunmen executed two Palestinians on a street in a West Bank refugee camp after the men confessed to collaborating with Israeli intelligence, witnesses said.

They said members of militant factions waging an uprising for Palestinian independence played a videotape of the confessions to residents of the Tulkarm camp before shooting dead the men, aged 21 and 25, in the street.

Palestinians have killed scores of their brethren accused of helping Israeli forces seek and kill militants.

Human rights groups have condemned the vigilante killings.

One of the men said on the videotape that he had arrived at an office at the camp to receive an identification card, which the Israeli Army issues to Palestinians for traveling in the West Bank.

He said an army captain sent him to a room, where a female officer seduced him. The captain later showed him photos taken of the incident, and said he would distribute them in the camp if he didn’t collaborate with the army.

“I told him, ‘I will work with you, just don’t embarrass me’,” the man said. “He (the captain) gave me 300 shekels and said ‘Tell me who throws stones during clashes, and who are the ones who throw Molotov cocktails’. I said ‘Okay’.”

The Israeli Army declined comment.

Palestinians have in the past been killed by militants or sentenced to death by firing squad by Palestinian courts after being found guilty of working with Israeli intelligence in exchange for money or administrative favors.