Mideast talks limp on amid bloodshed

GAZA - Israeli soldiers shot dead a Palestinian militant in a gunbattle in the Gaza Strip yesterday in fresh violence hours after talks were held to try to salvage a United States-backed peace plan.

Top Palestinian and Israeli security officials met to discuss a possible Israeli troop pullback from northern Gaza in exchange for a Palestinian crackdown on militants before the arrival of a veteran US diplomat.

Concerned about the future of the Middle East peace "roadmap", US President George W. Bush has sent John Wolf to the region to meet Palestinian and Israeli leaders in coming days in an attempt to keep the plan alive.

Wolf's job is likely to be difficult, as the bloodshed showed little sign of abating after a week in which more than 50 people were killed.

Just hours after Palestinian security chief Mohammed Dahlan met Israeli Major General Amos Gilad, an Israeli force shot and killed a member of al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, a group affiliated to Palestinian President Yasser Arafat's Fatah movement, in a shootout in northern Gaza.

Palestinian medics and the Army said four other Palestinians were injured in the clash.

Israeli media said the talks focused on a possible Israeli pullback from parts of the Gaza Strip and quoted Palestinians as saying they were positive.

Despite the violence, Deputy Defence Minister Zeev Boim said the offer to pull back troops in certain areas remained on the table.

But an Israeli security source said Israeli forces would "not move a centimetre" unless Dahlan presented a plan for cracking down on radical factions - a step he and reformist Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas have been reluctant to take.

Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon had proposed in earlier meetings with Abbas a partial withdrawal from northern Gaza as a test case that could lead to broader pullbacks in the West Bank.

But Abbas turned down the offer, saying he first needed to work out a deal with militants to halt attacks on Israelis.

After three days in which Israel killed six Hamas men and 16 Palestinian civilians, the Palestinians said they were ready to assume security control if Israel stopped strikes on militants.

But Israel, seething from last week's Hamas bombing on a Jerusalem bus which killed 17, showed no sign of backing down after vowing to wage war "to the bitter end" against militants.

Hamas, the main group behind a campaign of suicide bombings against Israelis, said it would flatly reject any deal between Israel and the Palestinian Authority.

"We will not accept a ceasefire," said Hamas official Mahmoud al-Zahar.

Despite that, Egyptian security officials plan to visit Gaza today to try to coax Hamas into resuming talks with the Palestinian Authority, say security sources.

US Secretary of State Colin Powell is due to meet other members of the so-called "quartet" of mediators - the United Nations, the European Union and Russia - in Jordan next weekend.

- REUTERS