OCCUPIED JERUSALEM, March 9 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - More than 400 Palestinians, including some 60 members of the security services, were abducted by the Israeli occupation army in the northern West Bank refugee camp of Tulkarem over the past 24 hours and taken to Israel for interrogation, military sources said Saturday.

The Israeli army occupied Tulkarem and the two neighboring refugee camps Thursday after fighting that killed seven Palestinians and one Israeli soldier, Tulkarem camp was still occupied Saturday, reported Agence France-Presse (AFP).

The Israeli army also raided  security positions in the West Bank city of Nablus and the southern Gaza Strip city of Khan Yunis overnight, an army statement said Saturday.

Helicopters fired at least two rockets on the building of the Nablus governor, while a special unit destroyed a building used by Palestinians to fire on soldiers and settlers near Khan Yunis, the statement said.

Meanwhile, amidst international condemnation for Israeli aggression, hawkish Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said for the first time that ceasefire talks with the Palestinians would have to take place "under fire”, reported AFP.

Sharon's U-turn came after Israel sent its tanks and helicopters into the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, resulting in heavy clashes with gunmen and scenes of carnage that left 40 dead on Friday, and ahead of new missions to the region by U.S. Middle East peace envoy Anthony Zinni and Vice President Dick Cheney.

On Friday when Washington criticized "both sides" saying was bringing the region closer to war. "I thought we could reach a period of respite before a ceasefire," Sharon told Israeli television. "But this is a war situation we are experiencing."

However, Arafat's top aide, Nabil Adu Rudeina, dismissed the surprise declaration from Sharon as having "no value" and said the Israelis would have to stop their raids into Palestinian lands.

"Sharon must realize that he cannot obtain an end to the violence with a military solution. His declaration on negotiations of a truce 'under fire' has no value, he must stop his massacres and aggression against the Palestinian people," he told AFP in Gaza City. Abu Rudeina earlier said that Arafat had called for immediate U.S. intervention to "stop the massacres" taking place in the territories, in a phone conversation with U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell.

"The Arab states call upon the international community to intervene immediately to stop Israeli aggression, that has no excuse or justification," they said a statement issued from the 22-member Arab League.

"They call upon the American administration to take urgent action to stop the aggression that threatens security and stability," the statement said. The call, the statement said, was "also directed to United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan and the member states of the Security Council to stop Israeli aggression."

The statement also called upon "the International Red Cross, and the international human rights agencies, to shoulder their responsibilities to provide all kinds of protection to Palestinian civilians."

Foreign ministers or their representatives from the League were holding an emergency meeting on the eve of a conference scheduled for Saturday and Sunday to discuss peace proposals for the region.

In another development, the Palestinian News Agency (WAFA) reported a statement by an Israeli peace movement ‘Gush Shalom’ said that despite the massive propaganda campaign mounted by the Israeli governmental media, in which “prime time TV audiences were treated to footage of well-behaved soldiers, following strict orders to avoid harm to the civilian population”, the reality was quite different.

They referred to a short reportage by Israeli First Channel TV which made a short reference to "armed Palestinians trying to escape in ambulances" and described it as a “a very cryptic reference for ordinary Israelis with no access to alternative sources of information.”

Gush Shalom said that their Palestinian contacts informed them that the Israeli army shot at Palestinian ambulances, in two separate incidents at Tulkarem, in each case killing medical crew members and wounding others.

The Tel-Aviv-based Physicians for Human Rights are trying to get the Israeli occupation military forces to let the surviving ambulance crews - and the other wounded Palestinians, to whom the ambulances were trying to get in the first place - evacuated to a hospital where they could get urgently-needed medical help, said the group.