Suicide bomber kills 10 in terror attack on Israeli bus

George Bush called on all nations yesterday to stop the "terrorist killers" after a day of Palestinian carnage in which a suicide bomber turned a crowded bus into a fireball.

He was speaking in Kennebunkport, Maine, after a Hamas suicide bomber blew up a bus near the Jewish holy city of Safed in northern Israel, killing nine passengers and himself and wounding more than 50 in the early-morning rush hour.

"There were mangled bodies everywhere," said Nissim Hozeh, a fireman. The bus blazed for 10 minutes before the fire was put out. The dead included three soldiers, returning from weekend leave, and civilians. At least one was an Arab Israeli citizen.

Barely four hours later, a gunman aged 19 killed a security guard and wounded the driver and another worker in a telephone company van at Damascus Gate in Jerusalem's Old City. Police stationed near by shot the assailant dead and an Arab passer-by was killed in the exchange of fire.

Palestinian militants also wounded four Israelis, two seriously, in a drive-by shooting near Tulkarem and two more were hurt when Palestinians blew up a roadside bomb near Ramallah.

Speaking after the bus attack, President Bush interrupted a round of golf with his father to say: "I am distressed to hear about the latest suicide bombing in Israel. There are a few killers who want to stop the peace process that we have started. We must not let them."

Mr Bush did not specify which countries should act when he called on nations of the world "to do everything they can to stop these terrorist killers". But Joseph Lieberman, a Democratic senator, said America and its allies must "cut off the flow of support to Hamas and other Palestinian terrorist groups that's coming from Iran, Iraq, Syria and, I fear, Saudi Arabia".

Hamas claimed responsibility for the bus bombing, which it said was further revenge for Israel's assassination of Salah Shehada, its military leader, on 22 July.

The Palestinian Authority condemned the Safed attack, but blamed Israel's policy of "mass detentions, repressive measures and home demolitions" for the cycle of violence. Raanan Gissin, a spokesman for the Israeli government, denounced Hamas and Yasser Arafat, the Palestinian leader, who celebrated his 73rd birthday yesterday, for continuing to incite terrorist activity.

"The only present Arafat has given the Israeli people is death and bloodshed and the only present he has given his own people is to lead them further down the road to self-destruction," Mr Gissin said. He vowed that Israel would "continue relentlessly to fight against terrorism" but would not say what form its retaliation would take.

The Israeli crackdown on Hamas activists in Nablus, provoked by Wednesday's killing of seven people at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, entered its third day yesterday. Troops demolished nine houses of suspected militants and shot dead an armed Palestinian frogman who tried to attack a Jewish settlement in Gaza from the sea.

A spokesman for Ariel Sharon said Israel had suspended talks planned in the coming days with Palestinian officials. But it was not clear whether the US Secretary of State, Colin Powell, would meet for talks with Palestinian leaders as planned in Washington.