7 Die in Attacks by Palestinian Militants

Palestinian militants staged a series of attacks Monday, leaving seven people dead as Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat praised a tentative proposal in which the Arab world would make peace with Israel in exchange for a total pullout from the West Bank, Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem.

Israeli warplanes later responded by striking Palestinian security buildings in the Gaza city of Rafah, witnesses said. A Palestinian police building in the West Bank town of Ramallah was also hit, the Israeli military said. There were no immediate reports of casualties.

In the earlier violence, two armed Palestinians tried to infiltrate a Jewish settlement in Gaza and soldiers opened fire on them, the military said. Palestinians said one of the gunmen was killed.

The Israeli military said Palestinians also opened fire on an Israeli vehicle near Gaza’s Kissufim crossing into Israel and that a suicide bomber then blew himself up. Israeli officials said three Israelis and the bomber were killed and four people were wounded.

The Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, a militia linked to Arafat’s Fatah movement, took responsibility for the attack on the vehicle and identified the attacker as Mohammed Kasser, 22, of Gaza City.

An Israeli policeman was killed and another was injured when a man activated a car bomb, blowing himself up, on the highway between Jerusalem and the West Bank’s Jordan Valley.

Meanwhile, Arafat praised an idea reportedly being considered by Saudi Arabian Crown Prince Abdullah to offer Israel peace with the Arab world in exchange for an Israeli pullout from all the territory it occupied in the 1967 Middle East War.

In a statement, Arafat said the “important positions” presented by Abdullah represent support for the peace efforts toward creation of a Palestinian state in the territories, while giving “security for the state of Israel.”