Slayings Enrage West Bank

The bodies of five Palestinian police officers gunned down at the checkpoint they manned were dispatched Monday for burial in their hometowns, amid cries for revenge and furious charges that Israel had crossed another line in its fight to crush the Palestinian revolt.

The latest killings occurred on a day replete with shootings, bombings and more death--a surge that Washington called “very disturbing.” They were sure to stoke tensions today, when massive demonstrations are planned to mark the anniversary of the birth of Israel, a date that Palestinians lament as the Nakba, their “catastrophe.”

Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat and other senior officials branded the killings of the policemen coldblooded murder and warned that Israel would pay dearly.

The policemen, ages 18 to about 29, were shot and killed by Israeli forces at about 2 a.m. Monday in an operation that was cloaked in secrecy. Their bodies were found around a small tin shack that served as their barracks at a checkpoint here in Beitunia, a suburb of the West Bank city of Ramallah.

Palestinians saw the killings as part of an escalation of tactics employed by Israeli forces to wear down the Palestinians. The Israeli military, given a virtually free hand, has conducted near-daily raids into Palestinian-controlled territory, demolished houses and orchards, and carried out the targeted killings of key militia operatives.

But the shooting of five on-duty officers at a checkpoint that was familiar to Israeli forces shocked Palestinians.

Initially, the army said its soldiers opened fire on “suspicious figures” detected in an off-limits area. But an army spokesman later recanted that account and would say only that the incident was being investigated. The army eventually issued a statement saying its soldiers had identified and fired on an armed Palestinian at a site often used to launch attacks. No one claimed that the Palestinians, who were armed, shot first or shot back.

Raanan Gissin, a spokesman for the Israeli government, said the Beitunia roadblock, which is several hundred yards from an Israeli military camp, had been the source of fire against Israeli forces in the past.

“Our soldiers have been issued orders to take no chances,” Gissin said. “Palestinian forces are more and more taking an active role in terrorism, so it creates a new kind of environment. . . . But this was not an assassination plot. Israeli soldiers don’t kill in cold blood.”

Ali Khadi, 70, was among the residents who emerged after the shooting to find the bodies. He said it had been quiet in the area until then.

“We’d come out at night, sit in chairs with the policemen and drink coffee,” the retired shopkeeper said.

Blood was splattered around the tin guardhouse, which is just large enough to accommodate a metal bunk bed, a ratty sofa and a color TV. It sat incongruously at the base of a billboard advertising Viceroy cigarettes, “The Big Taste of America.”

Judging by the meat found in a pot on the stove of their tiny kitchen, the men may have been preparing a meal. One was outside on guard duty and the others apparently emerged as the shooting began, residents said.

The government of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon says the Israeli tactics are aimed at stopping the mortar fire, sniping and terrorist bombings that Palestinians have used to target Jews since the uprising erupted 7 1/2 months ago. But the violence has only escalated, and on Monday, Israel’s main newspapers chose especially strong language to question the tactics.

“Only a revenge-seeking fool could believe that eliminations and missile fire, the demolition of neighborhoods, the killing of soldiers and civilians and the destruction of homes can restore personal calm and security,” the largest daily, Yediot Aharonot, said in an editorial that advocated an urgent opening of talks with the Palestinians.

The dead policemen belonged to the paramilitary National Security Forces, under the command of Haj Ismail Jaber. It is one of more than a dozen Palestinian security or paramilitary forces but is not one that Israel had implicated previously in attacks against Israeli citizens.

“These men were not killed in a combat situation,” Jaber said in an interview minutes before the flag-draped bodies were loaded into the backs of three ambulances.

Jaber and an array of senior political and security officials were among the thousands of men who gathered outside Ramallah Hospital, chanting, “Revenge!” and then marching in a huge funeral cortege through the city. Many of the men fired assault rifles as they went.

The ambulances were to take the dead policemen to their hometowns in the Gaza Strip for burial. After being held up for several hours by Israeli soldiers, the vehicles were allowed to proceed.

By late afternoon, Palestinian gunmen were firing on the Jewish neighborhood of Gilo, on the disputed southern outskirts of Jerusalem, and at Rachel’s Tomb, a Jewish holy site at the entrance to the Palestinian-controlled city of Bethlehem. At least four Israelis were wounded in Gilo, and the Israelis responded with tank fire. Another Israeli was seriously wounded in a shooting at a bus north of Ramallah.