Israeli gunfire killed two Palestinian boys in clashes in the West Bank today when violence boiled over a day after Israel ended a siege of Yasser Arafat under US pressure.
Witnesses and medical officials said Israeli tanks opened fire at youths lobbing stones and petrol bombs at them in the city of Nablus, killing a 10-year-old boy.
A second boy was killed by Israeli forces fighting Palestinian gunmen in a clash that raged on after nightfall.
An army spokesman had no immediate comment on the deaths. Palestinian witnesses said Israeli forces surrounded a building in the centre of the city of more than 115,000 Palestinians in an apparent attempt to arrest a suspected militant.
Israel sent forces into West Bank cities after suicide bombings in June and has enforced military curfews since then.
Tanks and troops rumbled into Mr Arafat's compound in Ramallah two weeks ago after two Palestinian bombings killed seven people.
Under US pressure to avoid upsetting plans for possible war on Iraq, Israeli Prime Minister Mr Ariel Sharon withdrew the forces from the Palestinian president's headquarters yesterday, a move which drew domestic criticism over the handling of the siege.
The pullback from Mr Arafat's "Muqata" headquarters was an embarrassing climbdown for Mr Sharon following a message from US President George W. Bush demanding a speedy end to the blockade.
Mr Bush's rare rebuke appeared to signal a new dynamic in Mr Sharon's close relationship with the president and in the prime minister's policy towards the Palestinians, who have accused the White House of turning a blind eye to Israeli army clampdowns. Israeli newspaper commentators voiced criticism of Sharon's handling of the siege that drew international condemnation.
A UN Security Council resolution had demanded an end to the siege and quick withdrawal from Palestinian cities.
Mr Arafat told reporters in Ramallah today that Israel should now implement all of the resolution "so that we could immediately go back to negotiations and establishing our Palestinian state with holy Jerusalem as its capital".