JERUSALEM (Islamweb & News Agencies) - Israeli troops advanced into two Palestinian-ruled cities Saturday, precipitating new clashes in a wave of intifadha, uprising against Israeli occupation, that has claimed at least 14 lives, 13 Palestinians and an Israeli, since the assassination of an Israeli cabinet minister.(Read photo caption) Israeli tanks and occupation troops moved 150 yards into the West Bank city of Qualqilya under cover of machine-gun fire well before dawn, killing a Palestinian in front of his house as helicopters hovered overhead, Palestinian witnesses said.
Palestinian Resistance men opened fire on Israeli occupation troops and armored vehicles as they crossed several hundred yards into the West Bank city of Tulkarm in another early raid, Palestinian witnesses said.
The lates incursion into Palestinian-ruled territory came in the wake of Wednesday's assassination of ultranationalist Tourism Minister Rehavam Zeevi by Palestinian leftist resistance men.
Stoking fears that the year-old conflict is spinning out of control, Israeli tanks had occupied Palestinian-ruled Bethlehem and six Palestinians were killed in fighting in the West Bank Friday.
The toll since Zeevi's death is 13 Palestinians and one Israeli killed, and dozens wounded.
The fighting defied U.S. calls for calm and threatened peace efforts that Washington considers vital to its efforts to maintain Arab support for its anti-terror offensive.
U.S. CRITICISM, NOT DIRECT APPEAL
A Palestinian youth aims a stone in a slingshot at an Israeli tank positioned on a main road in the West Bank town of Bethlehem Friday Oct. 19, 2001. In one of Israel's biggest incursions into Palestinian territory, the army sent tanks into biblical Bethlehem on Friday, commandeering two hotels for its troops as it stepped up pressure on the Palestinians following the killing of an Israeli Cabinet minister. (AP Photo/Lefteris Pitarakis
PHOTO CAPTION:
Israeli tanks and occupation troops occupied parts of Palestinian-ruled Bethlehem on October 19, 2001 after a surge of intifadha confrontations against Israeli occupation that stoked fears of worse bloodshed following the killing of an Israeli cabinet minister. (Reuters Graphic)