Israel, Palestinians to Resume Security Talks Despite ViolenceIsraeli and Palestinian security officials are scheduled to meet again on Sunday despite a weekend of escalating violence between the two sides, an official at Israeli prime minister's office said.The security talks will be broken into two meeting groups, one in the West Bank and the other in the Gaza Strip, the official said, adding that they will try to contain the violence on the ground and lay the foundation for the resumption of peace talks. But the talks were overshadowed by the escalation of violence at the weekend. On Sunday morning, Israeli police sappers detonated three bombs, apparently directed against Israeli targets in Israel and the West Bank. One explosive device was defused in a commercial center in northern Israeli coastal city of Netanya. In another incident, a bomb blew up in the West Bank settlement of Sha'arei Tikvah near the West Bank city of Nablus, damaging two homes but wounding nobody. The third bomb exploded close to a school bus traveling near Nablus, causing no injuries to bus passengers. But Israel's Army Radio reported that a body was found near the bus, most likely that of a suicide bomber. On Saturday, five Israeli teenagers were injured, one of them seriously, in a mortar attack against Jewish settlements in the Gaza Strip. Late Saturday night, an Israeli civilian was killed and his wife and two other passengers in a car were wounded by gunmen in a drive-by shooting incident near the northern Israeli city of Umm- el-Fahm. Meanwhile, Israeli soldiers shot and killed a 34-year-old Palestinian near the entrance to the West Bank town of Bethlehem on Saturday. There was also an exchange of gunfire between Israeli army and Palestinians near the Neve Dekalim industrial zone in the southern Gaza Strip Sunday morning. In response to the fire-exchange, Israeli tanks later fired shells on a Palestinian police post near Khan Yunis in the southern Gaza Strip. There are no reports of casualties on either side. In a related development, the Israeli Defense Ministry is expected to go ahead with a plan to allow more Palestinian workers to enter Israel for work despite the violence. Israeli Defense Minister Binyamin Ben Eliezer has approved the plan to issue 11,000 additional work permits for the Palestinians. |
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