Gaza gunman kill 2 Israelis as Rice ends visit

By Nidal al-Mughrabi

GAZA (Reuters) – Palestinian militants killed two Israelis
near the Gaza border on Sunday as Secretary Condoleezza Rice
departed the region after trying to save a fragile ceasefire
ahead of Israel’s Gaza pullout.

The militant groups Islamic Jihad, the Popular Resistance
Committees, and al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, part of Palestinian
President Mahmoud Abbas’s Fatah group, said they carried out
the shooting in response to Israeli attacks on Palestinian
gunmen.

“Blood for blood and a killing for a killing,” an al-Aqsa
spokesman told reporters in Gaza.

Rice wrapped up a three-day visit to the region aimed at
preserving a shaky truce Israeli and Palestinian leaders
declared in February and to ensure Israel’s planned pullout
from Gaza next month goes smoothly in wake of fresh violence.

The militants fired at a vehicle near a Gaza border
crossing, killing an Israeli couple, the army said, adding that
they were not residents of nearby Jewish settlements. Security
forces then shot dead one of the gunmen.

Spokesmen from all three militant groups confirmed they had
lost contact with one of their members. They said the groups
were still committed to the truce but vowed more attacks if
Israel continued to arrest and kill Palestinians in the West
Bank and Gaza.

“We are committed to calm but are also committed to
responding to Zionist violations (of the ceasefire),” an
Islamic Jihad spokesman said.

State Department spokesman Sean McCormack called the
shooting “a senseless act of violence.”

“The incident underscores the need for the parties working
individually and in cooperation to maintain an atmosphere of
calm free from violence during this period in the runup to the
withdrawal and during the Gaza disengagement,” he told
reporters aboard Rice’s plane as she flew home from Israel.

RICE PRAISES ABBAS’S EFFORTS

Rice earlier praised efforts by Abbas to stop militants but
said more action needed to be taken against them, especially to
ensure Palestinian attacks do not hamper Israel’s Gaza pullout,
its first from land Palestinians want as a state.

Gaza gunmen have upped rocket and mortar bomb attacks
despite the truce. Israel has vowed to strike back at militants
who may try to disrupt its planned withdrawal from all 21
settlements in Gaza and four of 120 in the West Bank.

Israel has killed 15 Palestinians, mainly gunmen, since a
Palestinian suicide bombing killed five Israelis earlier this
month. It has also resumed air strikes against militants.

Washington sees the pullout as a step toward reviving peace
talks. Israeli settlers and right-wingers, who view the West
Bank and Gaza as their biblical birthright, say the pullout
would reward Palestinian militants.

Palestinians welcome the move but fear Prime Minister Ariel
Sharon will strengthen the Israeli hold on the West Bank under
what he calls “disengagement” from conflict.

Rice also urged Israel on Saturday not to seal off Gaza
from the outside world after the pullout, echoing a key
Palestinian demand. Palestinian officials said Israel had not
done enough to discuss key aspects of the plan.

Some 8,500 settlers would leave Gaza, home to 1.4 million
Palestinians. But only a few hundred of more than 230,000
settlers will be removed from the West Bank, where they live
alongside 2.4 million Palestinians.

(Additional reporting by Saul Hudson and Corinne Heller in
Jerusalem)