Israeli troops kill woman in W.Bank raid

TULKARM, West Bank, May 1: Israeli troops today killed a Palestinian woman during a raid on a suspected militant hideout in the occupied West Bank, witnesses and medical sources said.

They said soldiers surrounded a house in the city of Tulkarm and called on its occupants to come out. They then opened fire, and some of the bullets penetrated a nearby home, fatally wounding Eitef Zalat, 45, witnesses and medics said.

''She was hit in the head and taken to hospital,'' Zalat's daughter, Ansam, told Reuters. Doctors declared her dead. Ansam and one of her sisters also suffered wounds to the lower body.

The Israeli army, which has recently stepped up raids against suspected militants spearheading a more than five-year-old Palestinian uprising, had no immediate comment.

Ansam Zalat said she did not see who fired the shots.

Another neighbour, Osama Subach, said he had seen no shots fired from the building surrounded by the Israeli troops.

Reuters