Suicide bomber, helicopter attacks in Mideast

JERUSALEM (CNN) -- Palestinian sources said Israeli helicopters struck a Force 17 security unit post north of the West Bank town of Nablus Wednesday, on the heels of what Israelis reported as a suicide bomber attack.

The Palestine Red Crescent Society said no one was injured but the building at Assira a-Shamaliyah was destroyed

Force 17 is the elite unit that provides security for Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat.

There was no immediate response from the Israel Defense Forces, but earlier in the day two Israeli troops were lightly wounded when an explosive device went off near them in the same area, the army said.

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Earlier, the suicide bomber attacked an Israeli military checkpoint in the Jordan Valley on Wednesday morning -- according to Israel Defense Forces.

The bomber was killed and an Israeli soldier was slightly hurt in the attack, the IDF said.

The Palestinian attacker was driving from the Nablus area toward the Pekaot checkpoint when he was stopped just before the bomb exploded. There was no immediate confirmation of the attack from Palestinian sources.

Also Wednesday, the Israeli military attacked Palestinian targets following the shooting death of a Jewish settler in the West Bank.

"In response to the murderous shooting (Tuesday night) near Tapuch junction in which an Israeli civilian was killed, the army struck Palestinian Authority targets in the town of Salfit" near Palestinian-ruled Nablus in the West Bank, said an Israeli army statement.

The Palestine Red Crescent Society reported no casualties as a result of the attack.

Each side repeated its assertion that international intervention was necessary to force the other to end violence in the West Bank and Gaza, but each has its own version of the type of intervention needed. Israelis want international political pressure to curb attacks; the Palestinians want international observers in the area to ensure an end to fighting.

Both have pledged, in essence, to uphold the cease-fire drawn up by the Mitchell Committee, an international, independent panel headed by former U.S. Sen. George Mitchell that investigated ten months of Israeli-Palestinian fighting.

Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, left, greets his Turkish counterpart Bulent Ecevit on Wednesday in Ankara, Turkey

The committee's report calls for the Palestinians to crack down on what it called "terrorism" and for the Israelis to freeze settlement activities. The report called for a cooling-off period followed by confidence-building measures, with its goal a return to Israeli-Palestinian peace talks.

Meanwhile, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon was in Ankara, Turkey, to discuss the Mideast crisis with Turkish officials on Wednesday.

It was Sharon's first visit to Ankara since his election in February. He was expected to ask Turkish Prime Minister Bulent Ecevit to press Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat to halt the Palestinian uprising.

For his part, Ecevit was expected to ask Sharon to accept Palestinian demands to admit international observers to help to try to end violence in the West Bank and Gaza.

Riot police surrounded the government office where the two prime ministers met, while hundreds of other officers were deployed in the streets.