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Curfew in West Bank town after girl's deathPalestinian militants ponder steps as cease-fire talks break off
JERUSALEM (CNN) -- The Israeli military imposed a curfew early Wednesday on the West Bank town of Qalqilya after suspected Palestinian gunmen killed a 7-year-old Israeli girl and wounded her sister and father. Israeli military and ambulance sources said the family was shot near the Eyal junction on the Trans-Israel Highway, north of Kfar Saba in Israel. The shots seemed to have come from near Qalqilya, where undercover Israeli border police arrested a leading Hamas militant Monday, an Israel Defense Forces spokesman said. The Israeli ambulance sources said the 3-year-old sister was in moderate condition and the father had minor injuries in the terror attack. A woman in the car also had minor injuries. The dead girl has been identified as Noam Leibowitz. It also said Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, a military offshoot of Yasser Arafat's Fatah movement, and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command claimed responsibility for the attack. The car was traveling on the Israeli side of the "Green Line" that separates the West Bank from Israel, officials said. Barriers have not been erected yet on that portion of the road. In Gaza, Israeli forces in Rafah destroyed several abandoned structures overnight believed to be used by Palestinian militants planning attacks against Israeli forces, according to Israeli military sources. The demolition was part of an operation to find tunnels used to smuggle weapons across the border, according to the sources. The developments occurred as meetings between Palestinian Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas and representatives of several Palestinian militant factions broke up with no breakthrough on a possible cease-fire with Israel. Representatives of Hamas, Islamic Jihad and Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades said they needed more time to consider their next move and reiterated that Israel must halt its assassination program of militant leaders before they cease their attacks on Israelis. The U.S. State Department labels all three groups terrorist organizations. Contacts will be maintained between the Palestinian Authority and militant groups, but no new meetings are scheduled, officials said. The Palestinian Authority has warned the groups it is not afraid to crack down if they refuse to honor an eventual cease-fire, but it also has told Israel that conditions must be eased to make progress on security. Powell heading to Jerusalem for talksU.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell said it would not be enough for Hamas to declare a cease-fire. He said the militant group also must give up its ability to carry out such attacks. "It would not be enough in the long term for Hamas to say they were not going to do it [stage terror attacks] right now [but] were not going to give up the capability," Powell told reporters en route to Cambodia. "Ultimately these terrorist groups have to not only stop committing terrorist attacks, but we'd have to eliminate their capability to do so. That has to be one of the goals as we move forward in the 'road map.' " Powell will confer Friday with Israelis and Palestinians in Jerusalem during a stop on his way to a meeting of the so-called Mideast quartet -- the United Nations, United States, European Union and Russia -- in Jordan.
The quartet nations will discuss how to keep the road map moving forward despite continued violence in the Middle East. The road map calls for steps by both sides toward ending the conflict and establishing an independent Palestinian state by 2005. Assistant Secretary of State John Wolf, who is working behind the scenes to support the peace efforts, met Tuesday with Abbas and Palestinian Authority security chief Mohammed Dahlan. Israeli-Palestinian violence worsened last week after June 4 peace talks in Jordan between Abbas, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and President Bush. CNN Correspondent Matthew Chance and Field Producer Dawn Tamir contributed to this report.
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