Middle East violence churned on as US President Bush delayed presenting his vision for peace due to debates within his administration over what Palestinians should do to win statehood.
Bush had been expected to unfurl his peace script in a major speech this week.
But a surge in bloodshed -- two Palestinian suicide bombings and an attack on a Jewish settlement that killed a total of 31 Israelis, followed by Israeli army counter-strikes -- has created a block.
Israeli tanks fired on a fruit and vegetable market in the West Bank city of Jenin on Friday, killing three Palestinians who mistakenly thought a curfew had been lifted, witnesses said.
US officials said the latest Palestinian attacks had scrambled the policy debate by stiffening arguments of pro-Israel, White House conservatives against creating an interim Palestinian state, as suggested by Secretary of State Colin Powell.
"They are saying, 'Why should be do anything for (Palestinian President Yasser) Arafat now?"' said a US official, who asked not to be named.
"There's still a live debate...on what exactly should be entailed for a provisional Palestinian state and what rights they would have. It (the speech) may not even happen next week."
As US officials agonized, violence continued 21 months into a Palestinian revolt against occupation in much of the West Bank and Gaza Strip, lands Israel took in the 1967 Middle East war.
Hospital officials in Jenin said a six-year-old boy, a seven-year-old girl and a senior city education official aged around 50 were killed after residents emerged from their homes to stock up on supplies. Twenty-six people were also injured, they said.
The Israeli army said in a statement "an initial inquiry indicates that the force erred in its action."
Cycle of Violence
Hours earlier, a Palestinian infiltrator shot dead five Israelis -- three children, their mother and a security guard -- in a West Bank Jewish settlement. That spurred Israel to send tanks into the nearby Palestinian-ruled city of Nablus.
In an apparent response to the attack on the settlement, Jewish settlers drove in a convoy into a Palestinian-ruled town near Nablus and opened fire, killing one man, witnesses said.
Bush had been expected to stipulate the early creation of a Palestinian state with provisional borders with-in a year and permanent frontiers within three years, administration sources said.
Before the final outcome, Arafat's Palestinian Authority and its security services, which Israel says have abetted suicide attacks, would have to undergo democratic reform, they said.
Israel in turn would have to halt military raids into Palestinian towns granted self-rule under interim peace deals during the 1990s and suspend Jewish settlement construction in the occupied bulk of the West Bank and Gaza.
But Middle East analysts fear the Bush plan could prove stillborn, seeing the two sides locked in a mutually reinforcing cycle of violence driven by Palestinian militant bombers and a ruling Israeli right committed to preserving settlements.
The Israeli security cabinet, grouping Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and top ministers, reacted to the latest Palestinian attacks by confirming a decision taken earlier this week to recapture and hold Palestinian-ruled land if attacks continue.
"This will happen all over the West Bank," an Israeli political source said.
Palestinian Authority officials say de facto reoccupation will aggravate militant violence, not quell it.
At least 1,413 Palestinians and 547 Israelis have been killed since the Palestinian uprising began in September 2000 after peace talks stalled.
(China Daily June 22, 2002)
