The Israeli occupation army killed three Palestinians in a security clampdown Wednesday, and a diplomatic dispute flared with Belgium after a court revived a war crimes lawsuit against Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon. Violence broke out a day after Israel sealed off the West Bank and Gaza Strip, imposing travel curbs on Palestinians marking the four-day Muslim Eid al-Adha holiday, amid intelligence alerts that resistance groups were planning major attacks in Israel.

Occupation troops shot dead two Palestinians in northern Gaza who the occupation army said sought to infiltrate the Jewish settlement of Dugit with grenades and knives shortly before dawn.

An occupation army spokeswoman said occupation soldiers shot at a third Palestinian in the area but his condition was not known.

Internationally illegal Jewish settlements in the West Bank and Gaza have been frequent targets of Palestinian resistance in a 28-month-old uprising for an independent state on those lands, which were captured by Israel in the 1967 Middle East war.

In the West Bank city of Nablus, Israeli occupation soldiers killed a 22-year-old Palestinian man after opening fire to disperse a crowd that gathered in response to arrests of resistance activists in a refugee quarter, local witnesses and hospital sources said.

An occupation army spokesman said Palestinians had shot at occupation troops as they were arresting two activists.

A 13-year-old Palestinian boy critically wounded a week ago by Israeli gunfire near the northern West Bank city of Jenin died in a Nablus hospital Wednesday evening, medics said.

Palestinian Resistance Kill Occupation Army Officer in Bethlehem

In the West Bank city of Bethlehem, a Palestinian resistance man killed an Israeli occupation army officer on patrol overnight near the Church of the Nativity. After the incident, Israeli occupation soldiers searched Palestinian homes and slapped a curfew on Bethlehem, which is revered by Christians as the birthplace of Jesus.

Israel's decision to extend the travel curbs on Palestinians it has imposed with varying severity during the uprising prevented people from visiting relatives and friends in other towns during the Eid al-Adha holiday, which ends Friday.

Palestinians say that such blockades have crippled their economy and amount to collective punishment for the uprising.

Israeli Spat with Belgium

Sharon's tough military stand against the Palestinian uprising carried his right-wing Likud party to a resounding re-election victory last month over dovish center-left rivals demanding pullbacks by the occupation army and a resumption of peace talks.

Israel's guardian ally the United States has endorsed Sharon's security policies.

But they have been sharply criticized by European Union countries and a Belgian court ruling relating to a 1982 massacre of Palestinians in Lebanon by Israeli-backed militiamen when Sharon was defense minister may aggravate Israeli-EU tensions.

Foreign Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will recall Israel's ambassador from Belgium and summon the Belgian ambassador to Israel to a meeting in protest at Wednesday's decision by the supreme appeals court in Brussels, a ministry statement said.

The court ruled the war crimes suit pressed by survivors of the massacre in two refugee camps could proceed once Sharon leaves office and loses immunity.

Plaintiffs had appealed against a lower-court ruling that Sharon could not be prosecuted because he was not in Belgium.

The refugee camp rampage occurred after an Israeli invasion of Lebanon overseen by Sharon to combat Palestinian fighters.

In 1983, an Israeli commission found him indirectly responsible for the massacre. He had to resign but was never prosecuted.

The plaintiffs are using a controversial Belgian human rights law, which claims universal jurisdiction, allowing the country's courts to try crimes against humanity and genocide no matter where they were committed.

PHOTO CAPTION

Israeli occupation army men prevent a Palestinian family from entering the West Bank town of Bethlehem at the El Khader checkpoint since it was declared by the occupation army as a closed military area Wednesday Feb. 12, 2003. (AP Photo/Oded Ba