Israel Panel to Investigate Killings : Mideast: An ex-secret service chief will lead the inquiry into the police shootings of 19 Palestinians on the Temple Mount.

The Israeli government today named a three-member panel led by a former chief of the Mossad secret service to investigate the killing of 19 Palestinians on the Temple Mount.

The government published a full-page ad in leading dailies today urging thousands of Israelis to respond to Monday’s violence by showing up at the Western Wall for Simhat Torah holiday celebrations Thursday night.

The investigation was ordered by Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir before the U.N. Security Council began debate on condemning Israel for using police force against rioters. The Security Council also was expected to order a U.N. inquiry into Monday’s blood bath.

“It will now be investigated by ourselves. We don’t need a probe by international factors,” said Yossi Ahimeir, Shamir’s spokesman. “The marginal point of whether it was excessive force or not is to be investigated.”

Israeli security forces killed 19 Arabs and wounded 140 in Monday’s clash outside the Al Aqsa mosque, Islam’s third-holiest site. It was the bloodiest confrontation of the 34-month-old Palestinian uprising against Israeli occupation, and it raised an immediate world outcry.

The panel was ordered to investigate events leading to the riot and the conduct of paramilitary border police in opening fire with live ammunition.

Asked what powers the committee would have, Ahimeir said it could make “every recommendation they see fit, and the prime minister will decide what to do with it.”

Israel radio reported, however, that the committee will not have the power to subpoena reluctant witnesses and that its recommendations will not be binding.

Ahimeir said the investigation would be headed by reserve Maj. Gen. Zvi Zamir, who headed the Mossad from 1968 to 1974. The other members will be Yaacov Neeman, a prominent attorney, and Chaim Kubersky, a former director of the Interior Ministry.