[Palestine Monitor, 31 March 2001, 9:30 am]: Yesterday, on Palestinian Land Day, the Israeli army killed five Palestinians in Nablus and one in Ramallah during civilian demonstrations protesting the Israeli occupation. 150 Palestinians were injured, several of them in critical condition.

The Israeli army shot live ammunition and tear gas missiles at civilian protesters, killing among others, 19-year-old Omar Marahil from Nablus who was shot in the neck by a high velocity bullet at 4:30 pm.

50 calibre bullets were shot at Al Rahme maternity hospital in Ramallah yesterday. The shots were fired by the Israeli army from the City Inn entrance of Ramallah, reaching the hospital well inside the city. Several bullets have been shot into the hospital windows, entering the rooms.

These Israeli acts of state-sponsored terrorism have reached unprecedented levels of severity and viciousness, putting every Palestinian at risk of possible injury or death.

JERUSALEM, March 31 (Reuters) - Defiant mourners buried six Palestinians killed in the latest spasm of West Bank and Gaza violence, as Israel's defence minister warned of a new gloves-off policy towards an uprising now in its seventh month.

Thousands of mourners calling for revenge marched in the West Bank town of Nablus on Saturday for the funerals of five Palestinians shot dead a day earlier. One speaker said Palestinians should be prepared "for the worst" from Israel.

In the West Bank town of Ramallah, mourners bore aloft the flag-wrapped body of a 21-year-old man killed by Israeli troops on Friday after witnesses said 1,000 people marched on an army checkpoint. It was one of the bloodiest days in recent weeks.

Israeli Defence Minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer told Israeli Channel Two television on Friday that Israel had "started to respond. There had been a policy of (Israeli) restraint... which in my view is over."

Passions were inflamed by a week of Palestinian bomb attacks, Israeli missile strikes on security targets in Gaza and the West Bank, and demands by U.S. President George W. Bush that the Palestinians in particular do more to halt the violence.

"I am trying to make the other side understand it would be worthwhile to return as quickly as possible to the negotiating table and that it will achieve nothing through violence, which I will fight," Ben-Eliezer said.

Key Gulf Arab allies of the United States stepped up criticism of President George W. Bush's administration over what they said was its blind support for Israel against Palestinians.

The U.S. State Department denied Palestinian claims that Israel's military crackdown had a green light from Washington.

"I want to make clear that there is no coordination between the United States and Israel with regard to their military actions against the Palestinians," a spokesman said on Friday.

He called on Israel "to exercise restraint in its military response, restore normalcy and to avoid provocative actions." On Thursday Bush laid blame for ongoing violence with Palestinians.

Stepping up pressure on Palestinian President Yasser Arafat to end the uprising, Israel banned 12 Gaza-based ministers from crossing its territory to attend a weekly cabinet session in the West Bank, forcing the meeting's cancellation.

The Palestinian government nonetheless issued a statement accusing Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's government of committing "a brutal and shameful crime against Palestinian people who took to the streets" in the latest protests.

A spokesman for Israel's military-run Civil Administration in the West Bank and Gaza said it had prevented the ministers' journey "because violence is promoted by this leadership."

Around 200 Palestinian women joined the Nablus procession, calling for Israel to be fought with every available means.

Several wore white scarves around their heads, indicating support for the militant Islamic group Hamas and the Fatah faction of Yasser Arafat who has vowed the uprising will continue despite Israeli air strikes.

The Palestinian Red Crescent ambulance service said Israeli rubber-coated bullets and live ammunition had wounded 119 Palestinians on Friday, six critically.

The unrest coincided with largely peaceful "Land Day" rallies by Israeli Arabs on the 25th anniversary of the killing of six of their brethren by Israeli security forces during demonstrations against government expropriation of their land.

U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan, in an interview with a Swiss newspaper published on Saturday, said he was in contact with Israeli and Palestinian authorities and again urged them to take immediate steps to stop the fighting.

"At the same time the economic situation of the Palestinians must be improved and the parties to the conflict must return to the negotiating table. This will not happen overnight, but it must go in this direction," Annan told Neue Zuercher Zeitung.

"If we want things to calm down, the people responsible for security must sit down together and discuss where the potential for tension lies, what grounds for escalation there are and which steps each side must take to defuse the situation."

Most dailies across the Gulf, including OPEC powerhouse Saudi Arabia, on Saturday accused the Bush administration of effectively encouraging Israel to step up violence against Palestinians by vetoing a Security Council resolution calling for an international force to be sent to protect Palestinians.

At least 366 Palestinians, 13 Israeli Arabs and 69 other Israelis have been killed since the start of the uprising.

A man died overnight in a Ramallah hospital of wounds sustained during Israeli air raids on Wednesday evening.

In Hebron on Friday, Israeli tanks and machineguns blasted Palestinian neighbourhoods. In Gaza, armed Palestinians and stone-throwers confronted soldiers late into the night.

The army said it returned fire at gunmen in Bethlehem, and defused a bomb close to a checkpoint between Israel and Gaza. It reported overnight shooting on Jewish settlements in the West Bank and on the outskirts of Jerusalem.

Jerusalem police said they were investigating a failed attempt by a Palestinian man to stab an Israeli policemen on Saturday near the Damascus Gate of Jerusalem's walled Old City.

Asked on television if he would consider sending troops into areas Israel handed to the Palestinians under interim peace deals, Ben-Eliezer said: "I will not rule anything out if they try to misuse territory which we agreed in advance was theirs."

Such action would require the approval of an Israeli cabinet that includes the centre-left Labour Party, Sharon's main partner in the coalition government.

"When they enter Palestinian cities, we will hit them deep inside the 1948 line...We tell them, welcome, the winds of Paradise are blowing," said Marwan Zaloum, head of gunmen from the Fatah faction in Hebron.

JERUSALEM (AP - 31 March) - Tens of thousands of Palestinians joined funeral processions Saturday for seven people killed in clashes with Israeli troops this week, and their leaders said the uprising against Israel will continue.

In the Gaza Strip town of Rafah, two Palestinian girls were injured in an exchange of fire between Palestinian gunmen and Israeli troops. A 4-year-old was hurt by shrapnel from an Israeli tank shell, and a 9-year-old was hit in the right leg by a bullet, said Dr. Radawn Al-Jiras of Rafah hospital.

The Israeli army said the shooting began after Palestinians threw a firebomb at Israeli solders, without causing injury.

In the West Bank town of Nablus, five Palestinians killed Friday in a clash with Israeli troops were given a joint burial. About 40,000 mourners marched through the streets, led by five Palestinian police jeeps and about 30 gunmen firing in the air.

``The martyrs are a message to the world that the uprising will not stop until we have gotten back our land and the Israeli occupation is over,'' Ali Faraj, a top activist of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat's Fatah movement in Nablus, told the crowd.

In the West Bank town of Ramallah, mourners buried a 21-year-old man, who was also killed in clashes with Israeli troops Friday, as well as a 54-year-old man who died of injuries sustained during an Israeli rocket attack earlier this week.

Since Israeli-Palestinian fighting erupted in late September, 454 people have been killed, including 373 Palestinians, 62 Israeli Jews and 19 others.

In Hebron, residents on Saturday inspected the damage from Israeli shelling the day before. The assault was triggered by Palestinian shooting on Jewish enclaves in the divided West Bank town.

Twenty-seven Palestinians were lightly hurt by shrapnel, Palestinian hospital officials said. In nine homes, windows were shattered or walls broken by Israeli tank shells.

Hebron has been especially tense since the killing of a 10-month-old Israeli girl there by Palestinian fire earlier in the week. The infant, Shalhevet Pass, was to be buried Sunday, after her father, Yitzhak, dropped a demand that the army first recapture the Palestinian-controlled neighborhood from which the fatal shots were fired, Hebron settler leaders said.

CNN Correspondent Ben Wedeman has been in the streets of the West Bank, where Palestinian-Israeli clashes have intensified in recent days. Wedeman was shot by the Israelis late last year in Gaza, but CNN has played this down considerably on air.

CNN Web (2310 GMT - 30 March):

Q: How has the atmosphere on the West Bank changed in recent days since Palestinian-Israeli fighting intensified?

WEDEMAN: The atmosphere here on the West Bank seems to be deteriorating dramatically. This comes after a week in this area when there has been a great upsurge in violence that's relative to the last couple weeks or even months, where there's been a steady number of incidents. What has happened is that after the three bombings in Israel and the Israeli actions afterward in which they hit targets in Hebron, Gaza and Ramallah, in addition to the fact that it is Land Day, which marks the day in 1976 when six Israeli Arabs were killed, what has happened is, the level of tension has really skyrocketed. It has been made worse by the fact that U.S. President George W. Bush's remarks the other night in which he placed a good deal of the blame for violence on the Palestinians. There seems to be the general, rapid deterioration of the security situation. The Palestinians feel the United States is no longer engaged in what once was a peace process. They feel that the United States is now closer to the Israeli position, which of course holds the Palestinian Authority responsible for the violence. They (Palestinians) feel that in a sense they're on their own. They didn't get the sort of support they were hoping to hear out of the Arab (League) summit, which was held in Amman, Jordan, also this week on the 27th and the 28th. They feel that too much attention was given to Iraq and not enough attention to them. So there's a good deal of desperation that the Palestinian question is being either neglected or ignored. Neglected by the United States and ignored by the Arabs. There's a tendency when that feeling becomes prevalent among Palestinians that what do they have left, if not to increase the intensity of their uprising? And today we spoke with not only members of Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat's Fatah political movement, but also others outside of it who believe at this point the Palestinians have no other option but to increase the intensity of their uprising. Certainly, they feel that the government of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has no interest whatsoever in trying to understand their grievances. So really the situation has gotten to a point where it seems that many involved in the conflict on both sides seem to think that a military course of action is the most likely.

Q: This is the first time you have returned to what is a virtual battle zone since you were shot and wounded by cross fire from an Israeli-Palestinian gunfight on October 31, 2000. How have you been dealing with your return to dangerous duty?

WEDEMAN: Well, I had a good deal of hesitation and trepidation about it. I've covered lots of clashes. I've been in lots of dangerous situations, but going back and having been through what I've been through, I was very hesitant. In a way I thought we needed to be there. It's a story that has to be covered, but I did not approach it with the same adrenaline rush that I used to feel in those situations and I'll be honest to say I was very careful. I did not run up to the forward areas, I was always mindful of where I could take cover if things got out of control. And they did get out of control. There was seriously intense gunfire that broke out. We had a warning that it was going to happen, but for a good half-hour we were ducking behind a building and there was a lot of gunfire. So I approached it with a good caution and not too much enthusiasm.