Suicide bomber kills 3 Israelis in West Bank

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israeli planes hit rocket launch sites in Gaza early on Friday, hours after a Palestinian suicide bomber killed at least three Israelis near a West Bank settlement in the worst spike in violence recently.

The flare-ups come just days after militant Islamist group Hamas took office and Israeli leader Ehud Olmert's Kadima party won elections with a platform of imposing a border in the occupied West Bank if peacemaking remains frozen.

The suicide attack late on Thursday was the first such bombing in two months. Rescue workers said the bomber was disguised as a religious Jew and was hitchhiking.

He talked his way into a car near the entrance to the settlement, then blew himself up. Hamas described it as a "natural response to Israeli crimes."

Israeli media said four Israelis had been killed in the attack.

A police spokesman said three Israelis were killed as well the bomber. He added that a fifth body had been discovered near the site of vehicle.

"Rescue teams are trying to identify who the fifth body was and that will take time," he said.

Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, part of the Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah movement, claimed the bombing and said it was in response to Israeli attacks.

"It was a natural response to the Israeli crimes, to the continued Israeli killing, incursions and arrests," said Hamas lawmaker Mushir al Masri. "Our Palestinian people have the right to defend themselves."

Palestinian governments under Fatah's control had recently condemned suicide bombings inside Israel, though used more careful language when it came to attacks inside the West Bank, captured by Israel in the 1967 war.

Israel said Thursday's attack near the settlement of Kedumim followed dozens of warnings of impending attacks.

"The Palestinians continue to remain totally indifferent and are not preventing terror attacks," said David Baker, an official in the prime minister's office.

ROCKET SITES TARGETED

Israel carried out airstrikes in the Gaza Strip early on Friday morning, hitting roads and a bridge believed to be used by militants for firing rockets into Israel, the army said.

Palestinian emergency services said one of the airstrikes on a bridge had burst the main water pipe in the area causing flooding. There were no reports of casualties.

Earlier on Thursday, Israeli planes carried out a further airstrike on a launch site used by militants to fire rockets into Israel. No casualties were reported.

Artillery gunners also shelled open areas in the northern Gaza strip in response to recent rocket fire, which killed two Israelis earlier this week.

Hamas, formally sworn to destroying Israel and behind nearly 60 suicide bombings during a Palestinian uprising, has largely followed a truce itself for more than a year.

But Hamas's exiled leader Khaled Meshaal stressed earlier that Hamas remained committed to fighting Israel.

"We do not promise our people to turn Gaza into Hong Kong or Taiwan but we promise them a dignified and proud life behind the resistance in defense of their honor, their land and their pride," Meshaal said on Al Jazeera Television from Beirut.

Criticizing Hamas for failing to soften its line since it won a January 25 election, a "Quartet" of Middle East mediators warned the group that direct financial aid to the Palestinian Authority would inevitably be affected.

Olmert's centrist Kadima party won Tuesday's election on plans to set Israel's final borders within four years, with or without the agreement of its Palestinian neighbor, by removing isolated settlements in the occupied West Bank and expanding bigger ones. That would displace tens of thousands of settlers.

Palestinians say such a move would annex land and deny them the viable state they seek in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

Israel withdrew settlers and troops from the Gaza Strip last year in a move that was popular among many Israelis.

"The terrorists have received encouragement from the expulsion of Jews," Daniella Weiss, mayor of Kedumim settlement said after the attack, referring to the Gaza pullout.

Final election results released late on Thursday showed Kadima had won 29 seats in the 120-member parliament, up one from earlier counts. To form a government, Kadima will have to align with other parties.

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