Palestinian police were deployed in the town of Tulkarm for the first time in more than four years on Monday after Israel gave Palestinians security control of a second West Bank city.

The handover of Tulkarm, days after Palestinians regained Jericho, was seen as a gesture by Israel after Palestinian President Mahoud Abbas won a deal with militants last week to extend a de facto truce.

Israel had promised on the eve of a Feb. 8 peace summit to transfer security responsibility for five West Bank cities, but the handovers were delayed by disputes over security and a suicide bombing in a Tel Aviv nightclub last month.

Soldiers removed Israeli roadblocks from around Jericho on Wednesday and on Monday Palestinian police were deployed in Tulkarm, a city bordering on central Israel and separated from it by a tall cement barrier.

"The Israelis have transferred security responsibility for Tulkarm to the Palestinian Authority," said Said Abu Fasha, the Palestinian commander of Tulkarm.

Dozens of Palestinian police took up positions after dark and erected two of their own checkpoints, while gunmen fired into the air and drivers honked their horns in celebration.

Israeli soldiers were expected to remove a checkpoint in the city on Tuesday, but the troops will remain in control of three outlying villages, including the launch-pad of a suicide bomber who killed five Israelis in Tel Aviv last month, officials said.

Israel had withdrawn from Palestinian cities under an interim peace accord reached in 1993, but its troops surrounded many West Bank cities anew, such as Jericho and Tulkarm, after an uprising erupted in September 2000.

Israel plans new settlement expansion

Despite the handover, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has approved plans to build 3,500 new homes for Jewish settlers in southern areas of the occupied West Bank to cement Israel's hold on Jerusalem, government sources said.

They said Sharon has also ordered a new highway to bypass the area and link the Palestinian-ruled cities to the north and south of Jerusalem, Ramallah and Bethlehem.

The plans were announced as Sharon lobbied for the support of hard-liners inside his rightist Likud party whose votes he needs to pass a 2005 state budget by March 31 or he risks new elections that could stymie a planned Gaza withdrawal.

Palestinian Prime Minister Ahmed Qurie condemned the plans as "a very dangerous step ... a kind of terror" against the Palestinians and in violation of a US-backed peace plan.

The peace plan calls for a halt to settlement expansion in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, lands captured by Israel in the 1967 Middle East war and sought by Palestinians for a state.

Violence between Israel and the Palestinians has dropped dramatically since Abbas, elected on Jan. 9 to succeed the late Yasser Arafat, declared a ceasefire with Sharon in Egypt last month.

While Israel demands that Abbas disarm militants as a condition for peace talks, it cautiously welcomed a deal he reached last Thursday to cement the truce as militants agreed to suspend attacks against Israel until the end of the year.

(Chinadaily.com via agencies March 22, 2005)