4 Die in Gunfights Between Israeli, Palestinian Forces

Israeli soldiers and Palestinian police fought gun battles in two West Bank cities Wednesday, leaving at least four Palestinians dead and about 300 wounded in the worst outbreak of violence since the two sides signed a peace accord three years ago.

The firefights--whose toll is expected to grow--erupted in Ramallah and Bethlehem amid widespread demonstrations by Palestinians over Israel’s completed excavation of an archeological tunnel along Jerusalem’s Temple Mount, a site holy to both Jews and Muslims.

The Israeli government’s decision to finish work on the ancient passage this week inflamed Palestinian fears that Israel is trying to assert its sovereignty over all of the disputed Holy City. Palestinians hope to claim the eastern portion of Jerusalem as the capital of a future state.

Since the election in May of the hard-line Israeli government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Palestinians have grown increasingly frustrated over what they perceive as Israeli foot-dragging on the peace process, combined with Israel’s newly aggressive policy of expanding settlements in the West Bank. Palestinian leaders have warned for weeks that the tensions could explode into an uprising reminiscent of the six-year intifada against the Israeli occupation.

Speaking in the Gaza Strip on Wednesday, Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat blamed Israel for the day’s violence, saying, “This is an escalation by the Israeli government against our people who are protesting a breach of the [peace] agreement.”

The Palestinians postponed a meeting, scheduled for today, between Israeli and Palestinian peace negotiators. Israel said the talks will be held Sunday.

Netanyahu placed an urgent telephone call to Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak to ask for help in defusing the situation and said he would be willing to meet with Arafat to try to restore calm.

But the Israeli prime minister also defended his decision to let workers complete the controversial tunnel, which the Israelis have said will increase tourism and trade in Jerusalem. Netanyahu accused Palestinian leaders of inciting Wednesday’s demonstrations and subsequent violence.

Earlier, Jerusalem Mayor Ehud Olmert accused Arafat of “incitement” in the violence and called Palestinian assertions that the excavations could undermine Muslim shrines in the area “sheer nonsense.”

He said the Israeli government was within its rights to open the tunnel since Jerusalem is the united capital of Israel. The Palestinians, he said, must accept that.

“They must understand there is no alternative to continuing the political process and Jerusalem is part of the state of Israel. While we accept all of the understandings [in the signed peace accords], there are certain things there is no chance they can change. . . . They have to understand the realities of life here.”

At the United Nations, where he is meeting with foreign leaders, Secretary of State Warren Christopher expressed “deep concern” about the violence. He said U.S. officials had telephoned Netanyahu and Arafat. “We have urged the parties to defuse the situation and restore calm in the area,” he said.

Earlier, State Department spokesman Nicholas Burns chided the Netanyahu government for complicating the peace process by opening the tunnel, saying: “We believe the parties to the [Israel-Palestinian peace] agreement should avoid raising new issues that will complicate negotiations and complicate the peace process. Both sides need to be very careful about creating new issues that will inflame violence.”

Although Burns refused to sharpen his criticism of Israel, he made it clear that the tunnel is the sort of “new issue” that Washington wants the Israelis and Palestinians to avoid. “They have both got to get back to the negotiating table,” Burns said.

The demonstrations broke out throughout Palestinian-controlled areas Wednesday, including Hebron, Nablus and Gaza City. In Jerusalem, rock- and bottle-throwing Palestinians clashed with Israeli police along the main shopping street of East Jerusalem and later in Palestinian villages on the city’s northern outskirts.

In clashes outside Jerusalem’s walled Old City, riot police broke up a march led by Palestinian Finance Minister Mohammed Zuhdi Nashashibi and the chief Muslim cleric of Jerusalem, Ikram Sabri, Associated Press reported.

“They are criminals!” the elderly Nashashibi shouted after he was pushed to the ground. “Netanyahu is an enemy of peace.”

In Bethlehem, Israeli soldiers and Palestinian police exchanged gunfire after protesters burned tires and telephone poles and tried repeatedly to set ablaze an Israeli army watchtower outside Rachel’s Tomb, a site holy to Jews. About 70 Palestinians were reported wounded before calm was restored shortly before midnight.

About a dozen Israeli soldiers were reported injured throughout the day.

The worst violence erupted on the highway just south of Ramallah, when Israeli troops tried to break up a protest march by more than 1,000 Palestinian high school and university students who hurled stones, bottles and Molotov cocktails at soldiers. The troops responded by firing tear gas and rubber bullets, injuring some of the students. Palestinian police then opened fire on the Israelis, said a top Palestinian police official, the Israeli army and witnesses. The soldiers fired back with live rounds.

Near the Israeli checkpoint that marks the southern entrance to Ramallah, prolonged bursts of automatic-weapons fire could be heard for more than an hour Wednesday afternoon. Spent cartridges and rubber bullets littered the ground near the checkpoint, along with rocks and construction debris hurled at the troops by demonstrators.

Col. Jabril Rajoub, chief of Preventive Security Service on the West Bank for Arafat’s Palestinian Authority, confirmed that Palestinian officers, angry over injuries to protesters, had fired on the Israeli soldiers, until Wednesday their ostensible partners in keeping order on the West Bank. “Our men began shooting only after they saw the young men falling left and right,” he said.

Khaled Mahmoud Ali Matour, hit in the left shoulder by a bullet, said he saw a single Palestinian police officer fire at the Israelis, sparking the gunfight.

Palestinian leaders called for a day of mourning today and general strikes across the West Bank and the Gaza Strip; the Palestinian Legislative Council is to hold an emergency meeting in Ramallah.

Times staff writers Marjorie Miller in Jerusalem and Norman Kempster in New York contributed to this report.