JERUSALEM, (Islamweb & Agencies) - Palestinian and Israeli security officials met under US watch Monday, while Washington voiced criticism over violence which saw four dead in just 24 hours. (Read photo caption below).
Israeli television reported the security meeting, attended by a representative of the US intelligence agency, the CIA, and security chiefs from the Israeli and Palestinian sides, but it did not elaborate.
The meeting came with talk of a Middle East ceasefire sounding increasingly hollow, and the region's mounting death toll seeing four more dead -- three Palestinians and one Israeli.
Washington criticised both sides in the conflict, with State Department spokesman Richard Boucher saying it was "very important" that both sides work to implement an immediate ceasefire and cooling off period as recommended by a commission chaired by former US Senator George Mitchell.
Meanwhile in Jerusalem, Israeli government spokesman Avi Pazner told reporters : "We absolutely do not have a ceasefire," laying the blame on Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat after Palestinian Resistance men shot an Israeli dead in the West Bank and two powerful car bombs exploded just outside Tel Aviv.
"It is quite obvious that on the ground there is absolutely no ceasefire," Pazner said. "Arafat obviously has not issued the orders."
But Arafat himself accused the Israelis of breaking the ceasefire, referring to the Israeli helicopter attack which killed three suspected Palestinian activists overnight.
The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine said the car bombings were in retaliation for the assassination of the three Palestinian activists.
"It's a flagrant violation of the ceasefire and a crime against our people. We demand international protection," Arafat told journalists in Gaza City after a meeting with UN Middle East envoy Terje Roed-Larsen.
And United Nations' Secretary General Kofi Annan Monday urged Israelis and Palestinians to do their utmost to prevent a collapse of the ceasefire.
"The Secretary General urges the parties in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict to exercise maximum restraint so that a total collapse of the ceasefire can be prevented," Annan's deputy spokesman said.
But the risk of such a collapse was very much to the fore Monday, as diplomats warned the region could soon explode into full-scale conflict.
"The mechanism which could lead to an outbreak of war is now in place, even if no one really wants it," a western diplomat in Beirut who asked not to be named told a Western news agency.
On the diplomatic front, France Monday condemned the Israeli killing of the three Palestinian activists three days ahead of a visit to Paris by Israel's hawkish Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.
"Israel's recourse to the extra-judicial execution of Palestinians in premeditated and targeted attacks, outside any legal authority, has always been condemned by France and the European Union," said foreign ministry spokesman Francois Rivasseau.
"The operations cannot be justified. They can only further complicate ongoing efforts to support peace-seeking and dialogue" he said.
In the meantime, Palestinian hospital sources Monday night reported yet another outbreak of violence.

A Palestinian man died Monday after earlier being shot by Israeli troops in the north of the West Bank, Palestinian hospital sources said.The Palestinian, a taxi driver, had been hit in the chest, the hospital sources said.PHOTO CAPTION:Israeli firefighters extinguish a car bomb shortly after it exploded in Yehud July 2, 2001. Two Palestinian car bombs shook the Israeli town close to the Tel Aviv international airport but no one was seriously hurt. (Barkay Wolfson/Reuters)
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