GAZA CITY, 31 October 2005 — Israel killed two Islamic Jihad activists hours after the group agreed to halt rocket attacks on Israel. Earlier Tel Aviv announced its intention to wipe out the group’s capabilities.
In Makkah, Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah and Jordan’s King Abdallah yesterday held talks. According to the Saudi Press Agency, the talks focused on the worsening situations in Palestine and Iraq.
A gunbattle erupted at sunset when Israeli troops surrounded the hide-out of an Islamic Jihad activist in Qabatiya, the West Bank home town of a Jihad bomber who killed five Israelis in a marketplace on Wednesday.
Palestinian security sources said at least two armed men were shot dead.
Militants fought troops nearby and Israeli helicopters sent down bursts of gunfire. The army did not comment.
The fighting in the West Bank followed a day of unusual quiet around the Gaza Strip. Palestinian officials said Islamic Jihad had agreed to halt cross-border rocket attacks and renew its “commitment to calm” as long as there were no Israeli raids. Israel had decided to stop airstrikes launched in response to the rockets, they said.
Islamic Jihad stopped short of saying it would resume rocket attacks in response to the killings in the West Bank, but said it “reserved the right” to respond to Israeli attacks.
“The enemy is not serious about calm,” said spokesman Khader Habib in the Gaza Strip.
Israeli officials said that, if rocket fire from Gaza stopped, then raids there would stop too, but that operations against Islamic Jihad would continue following the bombing in the city of Hadera. “There is an intent to continue it until they cannot carry out any more suicide bombings,” Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz told Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s Cabinet.
Israel has arrested leaders of the group, killed several activists and pounded Gaza with artillery fire and airstrikes. One airstrike last Thursday killed three civilians along with four fighters.
Early yesterday, the army fired artillery at the northern Gaza Strip, but no casualties were reported. The air force targeted open areas in Gaza on Saturday, firing missiles at fields and other areas Palestinian fighters are believed to use to fire homemade rockets at Israeli towns.
Israel has largely isolated Palestinian towns and villages in the northern West Bank near the hometown of the Hadera bomber. Concrete blocks and other makeshift roadblocks prevent Palestinians in these areas from traveling to other parts of the West Bank. The army said there are more security checks, but denied there were any new checkpoints in place.
— Additional input from agencies