Israel investigates checkpoint deaths

Palestinians: checkpoints have caused 20 deaths

The Israeli army has announced an investigation into the cases of two Palestinians - one of them a newborn baby - who died after being held up at checkpoints on their way to hospital.

Palestinian doctors say that a woman gave birth to a boy with breathing difficulties at a checkpoint on a road out of the West Bank village of Bardala.

The child was dead on arrival at the clinical, while the mother was bleeding heavily

Dr Abdel Hassan Daraghmeh

The car they were travelling in was reportedly prevented from continuing its journey for two hours and the boy had died by the time he reached the Tubas clinic about 20 kilometres (12 miles) away.

In the second incident, a 49-year-old man suffered a heart attack and died after being held up at a road block on his way to hospital in the city of Jenin.

Israel is also investigating the case of a Palestinian woman who was shot dead after her taxi drove through a checkpoint near the city of Hebron.

Suffocated

Dr Abdel Hassan Daraghmeh, who runs the Tubas clinic, told the BBC that the baby boy would not have died if he had reached the clinic sooner.

Dr Daraghmeh said the newborn's relatives did not know how to open his airway and he suffocated.

"The umbilical cord was still connected with the placenta and the temperature in the car was high," he said.

An Israeli army spokesman said that if the baby had died because of the delay, it was "deeply regretted".

Israel has increased checkpoints to curb suicide bombers

Earlier, Israeli police intercepted a suspected Palestinian bomber in a northern Israeli town of Afula on Wednesday.

The man was wrestled to the ground just as he was about to detonate a package filled with explosives and nails, police said.

Israel said the dramatic capture of a would-be suicide bomber was proof that the stringent security measures at checkpoints were worthwhile.

Police spokesman Yaron Zamir said: "A great disaster was prevented."

Nineteen Palestinians and 11 Israelis have died in violent incidents since both sides signed up to a US-brokered ceasefire on 13 June.

A BBC correspondent in Jerusalem, Barbara Plett, says the incidents are further signs that the truce is not working

Twenty Palestinians needing medical treatment are said to have died as a direct result of being held up at Israeli checkpoints since their uprising began in September 2000.

The demolitions provoked violent scuffles

Palestinians say that Israel's blockade of the West Bank and Gaza means 70% of the population is cut off from hospital care for months on end.

Harsh criticism

On the issue of Israeli demolition of Palestinian homes, an Israeli minister said on Wednesday that his government would continue to order their destruction if they were deemed to have been illegally built.

The United States voiced unusually harsh criticism of Israel for demolishing 17 Palestinian houses in the Gaza Strip on Tuesday.

"I'm sorry about the American criticisms, which anyway are nothing new, but Israel will continue to destroy illegal Palestinian-built homes that are trying to create a new situation on the ground, especially in Jerusalem," minister without portfolio Danny Naveh told public radio.

The Israelis say Palestinian gunmen were using the homes in Gaza as cover for daily gunfire.

Palestinian radio has reported that the Israeli authorities have sent a further 24 demolition notices to Palestinian families in the village of al-Midyah near the West Bank town of Ramallah.