Help missing 3, Palestinian told

Abbas condemns abductions, Israeli military’s response

Israeli soldiers conduct a military operation to search for three missing teenagers outside the West Bank city of Hebron, Monday, June 16, 2014. Israeli troops on Monday rounded up dozens more senior Hamas activists and killed a Palestinian in a clash with stone throwers — part of a feverish search for three kidnapped Israeli teenagers who Israel alleges were seized by the Islamic militant group. (AP Photo/Majdi Mohammed)
Israeli soldiers conduct a military operation to search for three missing teenagers outside the West Bank city of Hebron, Monday, June 16, 2014. Israeli troops on Monday rounded up dozens more senior Hamas activists and killed a Palestinian in a clash with stone throwers — part of a feverish search for three kidnapped Israeli teenagers who Israel alleges were seized by the Islamic militant group. (AP Photo/Majdi Mohammed)

JERUSALEM -- Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel told President Mahmoud Abbas of the Palestinian Authority on Monday that he expected his help in finding three kidnapped Israeli teenagers and capturing their abductors.

The telephone conversation, initiated by Abbas, came after Israeli troops killed a Palestinian man overnight as they continued an aggressive campaign across the West Bank, arresting a total of 150 people, most of them leaders of the militant Islamic movement Hamas.

Among those detained in the latest sweep was the Hamas-affiliated speaker of the Palestinian parliament, which has not met in years. Netanyahu and other Israeli officials insist the kidnappings are the work of Hamas, despite claims of responsibility from other groups, but they hold Abbas accountable because of his April reconciliation with Hamas, which led to the formation of a new Palestinian government that Israel has urged the world to reject.

"The consequences of the partnership with Hamas must be understood," Netanyahu told Abbas, according to a statement from his office. "It is bad for Israel, bad for the Palestinians, and bad for the region."

Abbas' office on Monday condemned the kidnappings and the Israeli military campaign that followed them, according to Wafa, the official Palestinian news agency.

"The presidency also stressed again the importance of not resorting to violence by any side," Wafa said, and "praised the efforts" of the Palestinian security forces "to maintain calm and order."

Nabil Abu Rudeineh, Abbas' spokesman, said the Palestinian president had called Netanyahu on Monday because he "wanted to assure the Israelis that we don't accept these kinds of actions," referring to the kidnappings.

"The political connection between the two men is very important at this point," Abu Rudeineh said. "It's very important that Israelis are willing to cooperate with Abbas on these issues. We are not going to say who is responsible. We are looking, together, to finish this issue peacefully, and that's the important thing. The message is the two authorities are taking the right decisions and working together."

Many of the arrests are not directly connected to the search for the missing teenagers but aimed at applying pressure on Hamas, considered a terrorist organization by Israel, the United States and the European Union. Israeli ministers were due to convene Monday afternoon to consider further measures against Hamas, including the deportation of members to the Gaza Strip, the destruction of activists' homes and cutting off funding of affiliated charities and organizations.

Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, the military wing of the secular Fatah faction, issued a statement overnight claiming responsibility for the kidnappings, saying the three teenagers were "in safe hands and outside the Hebron area." It also demanded the release of thousands of Palestinians in Israeli prisons, but that statement's veracity was in doubt. Two little-known groups had previously taken credit for the abductions. Hamas has denied culpability.

"We warn the Zionists against committing any more stupidities, including their violations of international laws by the arresting of the Parliament speaker," Mushir al-Masri, a Hamas official, said in a statement Monday morning. "Gaza and the West Bank are one entity, especially with the signing of reconciliation, which we should go on with."

The teenagers, Eyal Yifrach, 19, and Gilad Shaar and Naftali Fraenkel, 16, were last heard from around 10 p.m. Thursday as they set out to hitchhike home from the yeshivas in West Bank settlements where they were students. Thousands of Israelis prayed for their safe return at the Western Wall in Jerusalem's Old City on Sunday night and at impromptu services across the country.

A huge military operation engulfed the southern West Bank, with Israeli soldiers all but shutting down access to Hebron, the largest Palestinian city, leading to a strike by merchants.

Palestinian news organizations reported Monday that 400 soldiers raided the Jalazoun refugee camp, near Ramallah, leading to clashes in which a man they identified as Ahmad al-Sabarin was killed. Sameer Saliba, chief of emergency medicine at Ramallah Hospital, gave a different name for the 20-year-old victim, Ahmad Arafat Samada, and said he arrived at 3 a.m., already dead, with one bullet in the right side of his chest.

Israel also carried out airstrikes overnight in the Gaza Strip, injuring four people -- two of them children -- after four rockets were fired from Gaza into southern Israel late Sunday. Besides the bolstered checkpoints in the southern West Bank, Israel has closed its crossings into Gaza to all traffic except fuel shipments and humanitarian emergencies, blocked men under 50 from leaving the West Bank via Jordan, and canceled family visits to Palestinian prisoners in its jails.

Information for this article was contributed by Said Ghazali, Nayef Hashlamoun and Fares Akram of The New York Times.

A Section on 06/17/2014

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