Israeli forces complete reoccupation of five cities

Israeli armoured and infantry forces completed the indefinite reoccupation of five West Bank Palestinian cities yesterday while the army called up 1,000 reservists.

Spokesmen said they would stay in the cities ­ Nablus, Jenin, Tulkarm, Bethlehem and Qalqiliya ­ "for as long as necessary" to pre-empt the kind of attacks that killed 31 Israelis on both sides of the West Bank border last week. The Defence minister, Benjamin Ben-Eliezer, said they might be there for up to six months.

The invading units met little resistance, although in Tulkarm Palestinian medical sources said a man was killed and eight others wounded by a tank shell. The Israeli army said its troops had come under fire.

A full brigade has been deployed in each of the cities, most of which were under curfew last night. Troops also occupied several villages around Nablus and Ramallah. The army is still considering whether to enter other cities, among them Ramallah and Hebron.

Government law officers are also examining whether it would be legal to expel the families of suicide bombers from the West Bank to the Gaza Strip and banish suspected "terror operatives". Some right-wing ministers in Ariel Sharon's broad-based coalition are demanding the Palestinian leader, Yasser Arafat, be sent back into exile.

Unlike April's Operation Defensive Shield, the emphasis this time is less on arresting Palestinian militants or destroying their arms caches than on stopping the bombers and the gunmen leaving home.

Avi Dichter, the head of the Shin Bet security service, argued that there was no substitute for the army's presence inside "centres of terror". Encircling Palestinian cities, the policy adopted since the late-April pullback, had not worked.

After receiving European diplomats in his battered Ramallah compound, Mr Arafat accused Israel of trying to undermine the Palestinian Authority and restore the civil administration it maintained for 27 years before the 1993 Oslo accords. Mr Ben-Eliezer denied any such intention.

Also yesterday, the Israeli cabinet approved the construction of the first third of a 190-mile fence between Israel and the West Bank.

¿ The Palestinian Authority placed the founder of the Islamic militant group Hamas, Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, under house arrest in Gaza City last night, a Palestinian official said.