The Palestinian Authority accused Israel yesterday of trying to "assassinate" a US-backed peace plan by killing Islamic militants in helicopter attacks that have drawn vows of revenge.
In the latest such strike, Israel killed a commander and three other members of Hamas's armed wing in the Gaza Strip on Sunday, accusing the Palestinian Authority of failing to crack down on militants as mandated by the "road map" peace plan.
"I think that [Prime Minister Ariel] Sharon's government plans to assassinate the road map ... that some extremists in the US administration are facilitating this mission for Israel," said Palestinian Cabinet minister Yasser Abed Rabbo.
US President George W. Bush has responded to a surge in tit-for-tat violence and the collapse of a seven-week-old truce by stepping up calls for Palestinian Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas to dismantle militant groups.
Palestinian security forces under his control have begun sealing weapons smuggling tunnels between Egypt and the Gaza Strip and have arrested several militants -- moves which Israel dismissed as superficial.
Israeli Deputy Defense Minister Zeev Boim said once the Palestinians cleared "the first hurdle of dismantling terrorist organizations" it would be possible "to continue to treat this sick conflict."
"It [the road map] is in the emergency room and attached to tubes, but people come out of emergency rooms safely," he told Israel Radio.
The killing of Ahmed Shtewe, 24, and the other members of Hamas's Izz-el-Deen al-Qassam armed wing followed a vow by Israel's army chief Moshe Yaalon to hunt down Islamic militants if Palestinian security forces did not.
Hamas' spiritual leader Sheikh Ahmed Yassin said Israel would "pay the price" for killing members of his group.
Hamas and other militant groups had already vowed to carry out revenge attacks after Israel assassinated senior Hamas leader Ismail Abu Shanab in a missile strike in Gaza City on Thursday.
The assassination -- in retaliation for Hamas' killing of 21 people in a suicide bombing of a Jerusalem bus on Tuesday in yet another tit-for-tat attack -- prompted militant groups to dissolve the truce, which underpinned the road map.
The peace plan is designed to end a 34-month-old Palestinian uprising with reciprocal steps, including an end to militant attacks and Israeli army withdrawals, leading to a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza by 2005.
On another front, a spokesman for Hezbollah said in Beirut that Israel would hand over the bodies of two of the guerrilla group's fighters to officials of the International Committee of the Red Cross near the Lebanese border later yesterday.
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