Gunmen killed a Jewish motorist and a supermarket customer shot dead a suspected Palestinian bomber this morning despite a lull in the Israeli army’s recent bombing campaign.
The violence highlighted weak spots in Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's plan to create security zones, announced last night.
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Mr Sharon proposed "security separation" of Israel from the Palestinian territories last night, but he left unanswered questions about the protection of dozens of Israeli-occupied territories inside the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
Witnesses said a Palestinian wearing a belt packed with explosives set off a small blast in the Efrat supermarket before being shot at close range by a customer. In a separate incident, suspected Palestinian gunmen shot dead a 59-year-old Israeli motorist driving near the West Bank city of Ramallah.
The death toll has risen sharply this week as Israeli forces have launched retaliatory strikes by land, sea and air after a Palestinian attack that killed six soldiers on Tuesday. There was a lull in the Israeli raids today.
A government spokesman blamed the foiled suicide bombing on the Palestinian Authority and said it showed President Yasser Arafat was not sincere in his calls for an end to the bloodshed.
Mr Arafat, who denies such accusations, remained defiant in Ramallah, where he outlined his vision of the day when there would be a Palestinian state with Arab East Jerusalem as its capital.
"I'm sure that one of our sons, one of our daughters, will raise the flag of Palestine on all the mosques and all the churches inside the walls of Old Jerusalem," said Mr Arafat, who has been confined to his headquarters by Israeli tanks.