16 West Bank Colleges to Reopen; 28 Arabs Wounded in Gaza Clash

Under pressure from the United States and the European Community, Israel said Monday that it will reopen 16 Arab community colleges ordered shut during most of the Palestinian uprising.

But the army kept a closure order on six Palestinian universities with an enrollment of more than 22,000 students.

Meanwhile, the most violent confrontation in the occupied territories in three weeks occurred in the Gaza Strip, where Arab reports said soldiers shot and wounded 28 Palestinians, including 22 in the Rafah refugee camp.

U.N. relief workers said 38 other Palestinians from Rafah were treated for lesser injuries from rubber-coated metal pellets while about 100 people sought help for tear-gas inhalation after army helicopters sprayed the crowd.

In the occupied West Bank, three Arabs were shot and wounded by Israeli troops during clashes in the town of Tulkarm, Arab reports and Israel Radio said.

The order allowing community colleges and vocational schools to reopen will affect 16 West Bank schools with an enrollment of about 5,000 students, according to Shmuel Goren, coordinator for the Israeli military government in the occupied lands. All of the schools were ordered closed in January, 1988, after the army declared they were hotbeds of violence.

Goren said the community and vocational colleges were reopened “to bring about some change in the climate and feelings” in the territories. “When we reach the conclusion that the universities will really be a place for study, we will reopen them,” he said.

The European Parliament voted last month to freeze scientific and technical cooperation with Israel until the universities are reopened, and at least two planned Israeli-European Community conferences have been postponed indefinitely.

The United States criticized continued closure of the universities in its annual human rights report last week.