New Israeli Army Action as Joint Talks Collapse
Israeli troops demolished the homes of four Palestinian terror suspects in the West Bank today and tanks moved into a Gaza Strip town for a second day, leaving a 17-year-old boy shot to death. The action came after a joint meeting of security officials failed to agree on an Israeli withdrawal plan from parts of the occupied territories.

During Israel's incursion into the Gaza town of Beit Lahia, hundreds of children and teenagers threw stones at four tanks blocking the main road, witnesses said. Soldiers used a tank-mounted machine gun to drive back the crowd, killing a 17-year-old boy and wounding four youngsters. The army said soldiers opened fire because they felt their lives were in danger.

In the West Bank, troops destroyed four homes — two belonging to suicide bombers, one to a man who supplied explosives for an attack and a fourth to a suspected bombing mastermind. On Wednesday, Israeli military forces pressed their offensive, killing at least six Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip,

Today a fuel truck exploded near Jerusalem after a small bomb hidden beneath it detonated, the police said. The driver had minor injuries.

With tensions between Israel's Jewish and Arab citizens already running high, the Israeli police today arrested two Israeli Arab nursing students on suspicion of knowing about an impending suicide bombing and failing to stop it. The two women were described as stepping off a bus in northern Israel on Sunday and climbing into a taxi after the bomber warned one of them that "something horrible" was about to happen

The bomber then killed himself and nine other people. Both women were released, and only the one directly warned by the bomber is likely to be charged, said Superintendent Gil Kleiman, a police spokesman.

The bomber then killed himself and nine other people. Both women were released, and only the one directly warned by the bomber is likely to be charged, said Superintendent Gil Kleiman, a police spokesman.

The bomber then killed himself and nine other people. Both women were released, and only the one directly warned by the bomber is likely to be charged, said Superintendent Gil Kleiman, a police spokesman.

The terms of the Israeli deal were proposed this week in a meeting with Palestinian officials by Defense Minister Benjamin Ben-Eliezer. He offered the Gaza Strip as a test case, saying that if Palestinian security forces demonstrated there that they would ensure calm, Israeli forces would withdraw from recently seized land in Gaza. Reports of the precise proposal differed, but Palestinians said that Mr. Ben-Eliezer indicated that the same deal applied to Bethlehem, in the West Bank.

But after a follow-up meeting of the two sides, the deal, which some Palestinian leaders had called a sellout, appeared to be off. Afterward, Nabil Aburdeineh, a close aide to Mr. Arafat, told The Associated Press that Israel had imposed new conditions that were "impossible to accept or even to implement." Declaring the meeting a failure, he said that Israel had not mentioned withdrawing from Bethlehem, just Gaza.

"The city is still paralyzed," said Hanna Nasser, Bethlehem's mayor. He said Israel was lifting the curfew for three or four hours at a stretch — not long or predictably enough for businesses to function. "Bethlehem, from the commercial point of view, is dying," he said. "From the social point of view, it is dying."
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/08/08/international/08CND-MIDE.html