Jewish settlers set fire to Palestinian offices in the flashpoint West Bank town of Hebron on Tuesday in retaliation for the killing of a 10-month old baby girl, Palestinian witnesses told AFP.
Offices of the Waqf, the Islamic religious authorities located in the center of Hebron where 400 radical Jewish settlers live in armed enclaves, were destroyed along with a nearby wooden cabin, they said.
The Israeli army on Tuesday slapped a complete blockade around Hebron and imposed a curfew on Arab residents following the killing of 10-month-old Shalhevet Pass, who was shot in the head and her father injured in a Palestinian attack.
The Israeli army ordered Monday the evacuation of the Abu Sneinah Arab neighborhood in Hebron, ahead of a possible military response to the murder of Jewish baby blamed on a Palestinian, said AFP. However, Jewish settler were prevented overnight to take over several homes in the neighborhood, reported Haaretz newspaper.
"Yitkhak Hass and his little 10-month-old girl were on the doorstep of their house in the central Hebron district of Avraham Avinou when a Palestinian sniper shot two bullets at them," commander Noam Tibon was quoted as saying by the paper.
The father was shot in the leg and badly injured, while his daughter died from a bullet in the head.
"It is a cold-blooded murder, there is no other word for it, because there was no provocation on our behalf," Tibon said.
Israeli radio reported some residents of the West Bank city had already started obeying the evacuation order, according to AFP.
The baby's parents, Yitzhak and Oriyah, have said they will not bury their daughter until the army re-conquers Abu Sanina, Haaretz reported..
Earlier, a blockade and curfew was imposed on Hebron following the attack.
"We imposed on Monday night a blockade and a curfew on Hebron following the murder of a 10-month-old girl by a Palestinian sniper" Ranaan Gissin, a spokesman for Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon told Haaretz.
"This cold-blooded murder is unprecedented and was committed by a member of the Palestinian Authority's security services, because they are the only ones to have rifles with telescopic sights," he added.
Sharon accused Palestinian President Yasser Arafat's Palestinian Authority of being responsible for the killing, said AFP.
Sharon "holds the Palestinian Authority responsible for the violence and the terrorism which led today to the murder of a baby in Hebron, also injuring the father," a statement from the prime minister's office said.
"It is a cold-blooded murder, there is no other word for it, because there was no provocation on our behalf," Tibon said.
"Today was a Muslim feast, and the Israeli army had allowed prayers to be held in all of Hebron's mosques, and there was no curfew measure in the entire city", he added.
"We retaliated to this attack by opening fire on the Arab district of Abu Sneinah" where the sniper fired from, he added.
Israeli troops responded with heavy machine gun fire and tank shells in the direction of Abu Sneina, a Palestinian Authority-controlled hillside Arab neighborhood of 15,000 overlooking the Jewish quarter.
At least 16 Palestinians were wounded in the shelling, including a three-year-old boy, said Haaretz.
According to Haaretz, Palestinians said they understood from radio reports that their neighborhood would be shelled in reprisal for the child's shooting.
They said some residents had left the area but most stayed at home, seeking shelter in rooms facing away from the Israeli army positions in the area.
A Fateh activist told the paper that those who shot the Israeli baby "acted on their own. Despite the enmity with the settlers, it's impossible to forget that the victim was a baby that didn't even know she was a settler," he said -- Albawaba.com
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