Woman Palestinian Suicide Bomber Kills Two Israelis In Jerusalem Attack

JERUSALEM, Sept 22 (AFP) - Two Israelis, including a policeman, were killed and 16 other people wounded Wednesday when a teenage Palestinian suicide bomber blew herself up at a police checkpoint next to a group of bus stops in Jerusalem.
"At about 3:40 pm (1340 GMT) a female suicide bomber approached a checkpoint protecting several bus stops and blew herself up," police spokesman Gil Kleiman told reporters at the scene of the blast near the French Hill neighbourhood in the Israeli-annexed eastern sector of the disputed holy city.
Kleiman said that the first victim, who had been manning the police checkpoint, had died at the scene of the blast while medical sources later confirmed that one other person had died in hospital.
The second victim`s identity was not immediately known although medical sources had earlier reported that one of the casualties was a nine-year-old child.
The casualty toll would have been much higher if it had not been for the border policeman who died after trying to stop the bomber from approaching the lines at the bus stop, Jerusalem district police chief Ilan Franco said.
An AFP correspondent reported seeing the severed head of the female bomber who had been a wearing a beige-coloured headscarf. Her legs had been blown several yards (metres) away from the rest of her body.
Kleiman said that that the attack "follows a higher warning level in the past two days although there was no specific information for these bus stops".
A spokesman for the radical Palestinian group, Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, claimed responsibility for the attack in a phone call to AFP`s offices in the West Bank town of Jenin.
He said on condition of anonymity that the attack was in retaliation for the recent killings by Israeli forces of a number of senior members of the group.
Sources in the organisation, an offshoot of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat`s Fatah movement, later identified the bomber as 18-year-old Zainab Ali Abu Salem from a refugee camp in the Nablus region of the northern West Bank.
Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, who has accused Arafat of giving the green light to anti-Israeli attacks, renewed his threats against his arch-enemy Wednesday, insisting the Palestinian leader "would get what he deserves" as he recalled the fate of two assassinated leaders of the radical Hamas movement.
"I have already said that we have acted against the heads of Hamas and against others in the manner that we have judged the most appropriate and at a time we judge most convenient," Sharon told public radio.
"When the time comes to deal with this case (Arafat), we will act in the same fashion."
Speaking after the attack, senior Sharon advisor Dore Gold said that it was too early to talk about its implications for Arafat.
In brief comments to Israeli television after the attack, Sharon vowed that there would be no let-up in his government`s fight against militant groups.
"This attack is very serious and we will be forced to continue our fight against terrorism. There can be no compromise with terrorism," he said.
The attack was swiftly condemned by the Palestinian Authority, with negotiations minister Saeb Erakat condemning "all acts targeting Palestinian and Israeli civilians".
"An end to the violence can only take place with the end of the Israeli occupation of Palestinian lands," he told AFP.
Earlier in the day, a member of another Palestinian militant group, Islamic Jihad, was killed by Israeli gunfire in the northern Gaza Strip.
Jihad and the Israeli army said Ossama al-Araj had been trying to plant an explosive near the Erez border crossing.
The latest deaths brought the overall toll since the start of the Palestinian intifada four years ago to 4,327, including 3,311 Palestinians and 945 Israelis.
Meanwhile the four sponsors of the roadmap peace plan for the Middle East were to meet to assess prospects for restarting the nearly moribund blueprint.
Principals from the international diplomatic quartet on the Middle East -- the United Nations, the United States, the European Union and Russia -- were to gather on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly.
But in an apparent sign of unease over the plan, UN chief Kofi Annan, US Secretary of State Colin Powell, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and Dutch Foreign Minister Bernard Bot, who was representing the European Union, planned to break with tradition and not hold a post-meeting news conference.
In London, Britain`s ambassador to Britain, Zvi Heifetz, said the latest suicide bomb attack was proof that Israel`s controversial security barrier in the West Bank was needed.
"Many denounce the fence, but fortunately they have never experienced the daily threat from suicide bombers," said Heifetz in a statement.