Two policemen shot to death in W. Bank

Two police officers were killed last night by shots fired at their patrol car near the settlement of Masu'a, in the northern West Bank. Police suspect the shots were fired by Palestinian terrorists.

Shortly after 8 P.M., police received separate reports of an overturned patrol car near Masu'a, on Route 90 in the Jordan Valley, and of a shooting incident. Officers who arrived at the scene found two policemen, both with gunshot wounds, inside the overturned vehicle. One of the two was pronounced dead by medics shortly after the car was discovered, and the other was declared dead following failed efforts to resuscitate him.

An Israel Police spokesman said the circumstances of the incident are still being investigated, but the main line of inquiry is that the two were shot by one or more Palestinian gunmen. The initial investigation found that unknown assailants opened fire on the patrol car, causing the driver to lose control of the vehicle.

"The two were killed by gunshots, and the primary suspicion is that the motive was nationalist," police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said.

However, no Palestinian group has claimed responsibility for the shooting.

Masu'a is located in the Jordan Valley, just southeast of Nablus and near the major West Bank settlement of Ariel. Due to the relative calm and improved security cooperation between Israeli and Palestinian security forces in the area, army and police patrols in the Jordan Valley are carried out in nonarmored vehicles. Israel Defense Forces patrols along the fence with Jordan are also carried out in nonarmored vehicles.

The two dead officers were members of the Samaria District's traffic police. At the time of the incident, they appear to have been driving relatively slowly.

"It is clear from our initial investigation that they were shot at close range," a police officer said last night. "As a result, the patrol car overturned. But we are still unable to say how the gunmen managed to surprise them, which direction they came from and how they carried out the ambush. All these things are still being investigated."

The security forces' response to the initial reports was cautious, out of concern that the gunmen had set up another ambush, possibly with an improvised explosive device. Scouts were sent ahead to check the area and locate the gunmen's footprints, and forensic investigation units were not allowed to examine the scene of the shooting for some time.

Nearby settlements were also put on alert out of concern that Palestinian gunmen might try to infiltrate one of them.

The IDF is keen to find out where the gunmen came from, since the area is considered relatively safe. Defense officials believe the assailants most likely came from Nablus, but Jenin has also not been ruled out.

The possibility that the gunmen infiltrated from Jordan is considered unlikely, since no footprints or other evidence have been found near the border fence.

Commenting on the attack, chairman of the Yesha Council of settlements Danny Dayan said that "anyone with sense knows the policy of removing roadblocks and releasing terrorists that the outgoing government has insisted on imposing on the IDF to its final days will result in more bloodshed. Unfortunately, the government did not heed repeated warnings, and this is the result."