TEL AVIV (Islamweb & News Agencies) - Prime Minister Ariel Sharon returned to Israel from Washington on Monday to decide how to respond to Palestinian Resistance attacks that killed at least 25 people and wounded about 200.
Sharon began talks at Ben Gurion airport with his foreign and defense ministers and other occupation authority chiefs before a full cabinet meeting scheduled in Jerusalem later on Monday.
Sharon is under intense pressure in Israel to retaliate fiercely to the succession of weekend bomb blasts in Jerusalem and the port city of Haifa, widely described as the worst spate of coordinated attacks in Israel in years.
An Israeli official said the United States, where Sharon met President Bush on Sunday, knew Israel would act ``in the way it sees fit.''
Secretary of State Colin Powell said Washington was not about to tell Sharon what to do but that both sides must be aware of the consequences of any action that Israel takes.
Palestinian security forces rounded up Resistance leaders across the West Bank and Gaza Strip after heavy pressure from Bush and Israel to arrest those responsible for the attacks, which pushed 14 months of Israeli-Palestinian violence into a new phase.
Israeli occupation authorities said they were observing their highest level of alert and had canceled all leave for occupation forces officers. They said occupation authorites were setting up roving checkpoints around Israeli cities to prevent more bombings.
Palestinian security forces were also out in large numbers after President Yasser Arafat imposed a state of emergency in the West Bank and Gaza. Israel's occupation army erected new checkpoints to tighten blockades imposed since the Palestinian uprising against occupation began.
Israeli occupation authorities say Arafat has done too little until now to crack down on Resistance, but Palestinian cabinet minister Ziad Abu Ziad told Israel's Army Radio: ``We have started to act at a much faster pace then ever before.''
Israeli occupation soldiers shot dead a Palestinian near the West Bank town of Jenin on Monday. The occupation army as usual claimed that its troops thought the man was trying to place a bomb but there was none on him. Palestinian officials said he was a farmer going to work.
The occupation army also said earlier troops had killed four Palestinian Resistance men near the West Bank city of Jenin on Sunday in an exchange of fire.