Israeli soldiers in al-Khalil

AL-KHALIL, West Bank, December 27 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - A Palestinian man killed four Jewish settlers, and wounded seven others in a Jewish settlement in the southern West Bank late Friday, December 27, before being shot dead himself, Israeli military sources said.

The Islamic Jihad resistance movement, meanwhile, said it carried out the attack in retaliation for the assassination of one of its cadres (Hamza Abu al-Roub), as well as seven other Palestinians Thursday, December 26, by the Israeli occupation forces.

"This attack was carried out by a commando of the Islamic Jihad," an anonymous caller told Agence France-Presse (AFP).

Speaking from Beirut, Jihad leader Ramadan Shallah also told al-Jazeera Satellite Channel: "The heroes of the Al-Quds Brigades (the movement's armed wing) carried out the operation".

"The operation is a clear message to the Zionist enemy that it can enjoy no security while it continues to perpetrate massacres against the Palestinian people like that on Thursday when eight Palestinians were killed", he said.

"(Israeli Premier Ariel) Sharon and (Defense Minister Shaul) Movaz asserted the crimes of their occupation forces against our people in every village and city will be stepped up.

"To them we say, you have committed all kinds of crimes against our people claiming to your people and the world opinion that security will be guaranteed.

"Now, I tell you, no security unless your occupation forces get out of our land," Shallah stressed.

The attack took place on the Otniel settlement near al-Khalil (Hebron), the Israeli sources said.

"The army has launched a manhunt because it is possible that another terrorist took part in the attack," an Israeli military source told AFP.

The efforts of the emergency services failed to save the fourth Israeli who had been seriously wounded in the attack.

Israeli public television reported that the Palestinian shooter succeeded in penetrating a yeshiva, or Jewish religious seminary, in the settlement and opening fire with an automatic weapon.

On Thursday, Abu el-Roub , a leader of the Islamic Jihad group was assassinated in his Qabatiya home which was then demolished by Israeli tank shells, Palestinian security sources said.

In a statement received by AFP in Beirut, Jihad branded the killing as "a criminal assassination at the hands of the Zionist enemy forces". The group vowed that "this ugly crime will not go unpunished."

Around 600 hard-core Jewish settlers (according to foreign pacifists and reporters, always heavily-armed and on the rampage most of the time) live in al-Khalil, guarded by Israeli soldiers, separating them from the 120,000 Palestinian population of the city.