Hundreds Riot Over Israeli’s Arab Killings

Police battled hundreds of protesters outside the U.S. consulate today and troops killed a Palestinian in the Gaza Strip amid new rioting over the massacre of seven Arab laborers by an Israeli gunman.

In Jordan, Palestinian protests broke out nationwide, and two people were reported killed and 23 injured. Demonstrations protesting the Israeli killing were held in the capital of Amman, the cities of Irbid and Zarqa and the Baqaa refugee camp. A Jordanian government official acknowledged only one death.

At least 14 Palestinians were wounded by troops in clashes in the Israeli-occupied Gaza Strip, including a woman five months pregnant who was hit in the stomach with a plastic bullet, Arab hospital officials said.

Another Palestinian died of wounds suffered in an earlier clash, bringing to 12 the number of Arabs killed since Sunday’s massacre. The number of Palestinians injured by troops since Sunday reached at least 826.

Throughout the West Bank and Gaza Strip, Palestinians closed shops and schools and stayed home from jobs in Israel for a third day to protest Sunday’s slayings in which an Israeli gunman lined up 50 Arab laborers and opened fire, killing seven.

In Israeli-annexed Arab east Jerusalem, police fired tear gas today to break up a protest by about 200 Palestinians, mostly women, who carried black flags of mourning and chanted pro-PLO slogans as they marched to the U.S. consulate.