2 Israelis Slain Along Security Wall Near Jerusalem

Two private Israeli guards at a construction site along Israel’s controversial security barrier were shot dead Saturday night by assailants believed to be Palestinians acting out of “nationalistic” motives, police said.

Using searchlights and helicopters, Israeli troops and police spent hours scouring the rough, rocky terrain near the site of the assault. No arrests were immediately reported, and no group took responsibility.

The shooting occurred on Jerusalem’s outskirts, in the Kidron Valley, a steep ravine that runs between Jerusalem’s Old City and the Mount of Olives.

The attack came as officials on both sides pressed ahead with efforts to lay the groundwork for talks between Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and his Palestinian Authority counterpart, Ahmed Korei. It would be the first meeting between the two leaders since Korei’s government was sworn in this month.

Both sides have indicated that they want to try to revive the moribund U.S.-backed peace plan known as the “road map,” but each has also expressed deep doubts about whether the other is prepared to begin talks in good faith.

Violence also flared Saturday in the West Bank town of Jenin, where Israeli troops fired into a crowd of protesters throwing stones, killing a child, according to Palestinian officials. The Israeli army said soldiers had fired at a gunman in the crowd but had no knowledge of a child’s death.

Palestinian witnesses and neighbors identified the child as 10-year-old Ibrahim Jalamna.

The two slain Israeli guards were watching over heavy construction equipment being used to build the security barrier, which has drawn harsh criticism from Palestinians and human rights groups. Israel defends the barrier -- part concrete wall and part electronic fence, bolstered in some sections by trenches and a wide buffer -- as a necessary bulwark against suicide attackers.

Jerusalem police spokesman Shmuel Ben-Ruby said the two security guards were in their car when two or three gunmen approached and shot them at close range. The assailants then fled with the weapons of the critically wounded guards, he said.

Both guards died of their wounds soon afterward, according to Israeli rescue workers.

Three other security guards stationed nearby heard the shots and fired at the assailants as they fled in a car toward the Palestinian village of Abu Dis, but the gunmen escaped, apparently unhurt.

“We believe the motive for this attack was nationalistic,” Ben-Ruby said without elaborating.

Despite bitter Palestinian opposition to Israel’s security barrier, attacks along it have been relatively rare.

In June, a Palestinian gunman and accomplice managed to make their way under a stretch of the barrier in the northern West Bank by crawling through a drainage tunnel. They fired at a passing car, killing a 7-year-old Israeli girl.

Most of the completed sections of the barrier are in the northern West Bank, but work has also been proceeding rapidly on a separate section surrounding Jerusalem.

This month, a United Nations report said the 435-mile barrier, if completed under the current route, would expropriate 14% of West Bank land, leaving 274,000 Palestinians in tiny enclaves and blocking 400,000 Palestinians from going to their jobs, schools and hospitals. Last month, the U.N. General Assembly overwhelmingly approved a resolution calling on Israel to halt construction, but the government said the building would continue.

Previously, under pressure from the Bush administration, Sharon agreed to leave temporary gaps in the barrier rather than driving deep into the West Bank to enclose several large Jewish settlements.