Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat vowed today that the Palestinian Authority would make a "100 percent effort" to enforce respect of a ceasefire with Israel.
"Despite the blockade and Israeli military escalation against our people, the Palestinian Authority and the PLO will deploy a 100 percent effort to consolidate the ceasefire," he said, quoted by the official WAFA news agency.
Mr Arafat also reiterated the "total commitment (of the Palestinians) to the peace process".
Meanwhile the Palestinian leadership condemned the deadly antiIsraeli shootings today in the Israeli town of Afula and the Gaza Strip that left a total of six people dead.
"The Palestinian leadership condemns the two operations, the one in Afula and the one near Gush Katif which targeted Israeli civilians," it said in a statement distributed by the Palestinian news agency WAFA.
"We condemn any operation which targets civilians, Palestinian or Israeli, and the Palestinian leadership has given strict orders to Palestinian security to pursue those responsible in order to prevent any Israeli retaliation," it said. "Those responsible for these attacks have endangered the ceasefire," it said.
Two teenage Palestinian gunmen earlier in the day killed two Israelis and wounded 34 others in a shooting rampage through the northern Israeli town of Afula, before being shot dead by police.
Just hours later, Palestinian gunmen blasted an Israeli bus heading for a Jewish settlement in the southern Gaza Strip, killing an Israeli woman and injuring another woman and a child.
Israeli troops returned fire and killed a suspected assailant.
Shortly after, the army launched an incursion more than a kilometre (half a mile) into Palestinan self-rule land in the area, with tanks and jeeps blasting their way in with shells and heavy machine-gun fire.
Israeli army officials said only that troops were searching the area for other suspected gunmen.
After the Afula attack Israeli chief of staff Mr Shaul Mofaz charged that Mr Arafat had "given the order" for anti-Israeli attacks, but the charge was angrily denied by the Palestinian side as a "lie."
The Palestinian leadership includes the Palestinian cabinet and the executive of the Palestine Liberation Organization.
AFP