RAMALLAH, West Bank, 2 October 2007 — Following several hours’ delay, Israeli Prisons Authority yesterday released 57 West Bank Palestinian prisoners from the Ketziot prison in the Negev Desert and took them by secured buses to the Beitunya crossing near Ramallah as a goodwill gesture to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in the holy month of Ramadan.

The prisoners got off the buses, kissed the ground, then boarded a Palestinian bus. An ecstatic crowd of waiting relatives clapped and waved Palestinian flags.

Israel was expected to free 30 Palestinian prisoners in the Gaza Strip yesterday, but the release was delayed until today, and it was not immediately clear whether all of them would be freed. Officials gave no explanation for the delay.

As the prisoners headed home, Israel said it was moving forward with plans to open a new West Bank police headquarters, despite US concerns that development in the area harms prospects for establishing a viable Palestinian state. The Palestinians accused Israel of undermining new peace efforts.

Most of the prisoners slated for release yesterday are from the West Bank, which is controlled by Abbas and his government of moderates. The others are residents of Gaza, which has been ruled by Hamas since June, when they defeated the forces of Abbas’ Fatah movement and took control of the coastal territory.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert announced the prisoner release — the second since July — last month as part of his strategy to support Abbas in his power struggle with Hamas. The prisoners are mostly members of Fatah, along with several who belong to smaller Palestinian factions. None belong to Hamas.

Israel is holding around 11,000 Palestinian prisoners, and their release is a central Palestinian demand. While many of those released yesterday were serving time for militant activity, none was convicted of killing or injuring Israelis.

In Gaza, Israeli troops shot and injured a 14-year-old who was waiting with hundreds of Palestinians at a Gaza Strip crossing for their relatives to be released, medics and witnesses said.

The teenager was moderately injured, the medics said. The Israeli troops began firing from watchtowers at the Erez crossing when the Palestinians began approaching a no-man’s zone separating Gaza from Israel, the witnesses said.

The military said troops opened fire at Palestinians who approached army positions at Erez and ignored warning shots. The soldiers aimed for their legs to avoid fatal injuries, the military said.

Hamas called yesterday’s prisoner release insignificant. “We congratulate the prisoners,” said Mohammed Al-Mudhoun a senior aid to Ismail Haniyeh, the leader of the Hamas government in Gaza. “We consider this...a humiliation for the leadership in Ramallah that considers this humble number a great achievement.”

A group of Palestinians with relatives in Israeli prisons gathered at the Red Cross offices in Gaza City, holding photographs of their imprisoned loved ones.

Israeli troops killed two Hamas fighters in Gaza yesterday in a nighttime gunbattle, Hamas announced. The Israeli military said troops shot two armed Palestinian fighters who attacked troops inside Gaza not far from the Israeli border. One soldier was lightly wounded by gunfire, the military said.

As Israel keeps up its military pressure on fighters in Gaza, Olmert is slated to meet with Abbas tomorrow. The two leaders are attempting to draft a joint vision of a peace deal that will be presented at a peace conference expected to be held in November in Annapolis, Maryland.

Meanwhile, Syria will not attend the Middle East peace conference set for next month unless the issue of Israeli-occupied Golan Heights is on the agenda, President Bashar Assad said in comments broadcast yesterday.

“If they don’t talk about the Syrian occupied territory, no, there’s no way for Syria to go there,” Bashar told the BBC, referring to the Golan Heights, which Israel captured from Syria in the 1967 war.

“It should be about comprehensive peace, and Syria is part of this comprehensive peace. Without that, we shouldn’t go, we wouldn’t go.”

In Washington, State Dept spokesman Tom Casey declined direct comment on Bashar’s views about the upcoming conference but he said the State Department would send out invitations at “an appropriate time,” including to Arab League members such as Syria.

— With input from agencies