A Palestinian military court jailed the killers of an Israeli cabinet minister today in a swift trial at Mr Yasser Arafat's tank-ringed compound in Ramallah.
Israeli Prime Minister Mr Ariel Sharon dismissed the move, saying he still wanted them extradited for trial in Israel, along with a Palestinian official accused by Israel of trying to smuggle weapons from Iran to Mr Arafat's Palestinian Authority.
Israeli troops killed at least six Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip in violence that coincided with intensive diplomacy aimed at calming the conflict.
Mr Arafat said after meeting the foreign ministers of Greece and Turkey at his battered compound that Israeli policies had effectively destroyed an interim peace deal he signed with Israel's assassinated prime minister, Mr Yitzhak Rabin, in 1993.
"My peace of the brave that I signed with my partner Rabin has been demolished and canceled," the Palestinian president told reporters. "Without a peace agreement in the Terra Sancta (Holy Land), there will be no peace in the Middle East."
A Palestinian Authority statement said the military court, convened in Mr Arafat's compound, had given jail terms ranging from one to 18 years to four men for their part in far-right tourism minister Mr Rehavam Zeevi's assassination in October.
Mr Sharon said the Palestinians must hand over the four men, as well as a finance ministry official who Palestinian officials say is under investigation over the arms smuggling charge.
"Israel demands they (the Palestinians) extradite the murderers of Minister Zeevi; and Fuad Shubaki, the man who was behind the ties between Iran and the Palestinian Authority and who was responsible, with Arafat's approval, for financing the expenses of suicide bombers," Mr Sharon told reporters.
Mr Sharon, who sent tanks to Mr Arafat's headquarters on March 29th at the start of a West Bank offensive launched after a spate of suicide bombings, has said he will keep Mr Arafat confined until he hands over the men for trial in Israel.