GAZA CITY, 28 June 2003 — A cease-fire deal appeared likely as Hamas, Islamic Jihad and the Fatah movement finalized a truce document yesterday and Israeli and Palestinian officials reached an agreement in principle over an Israeli Army withdrawal from the Gaza Strip and Bethlehem. The withdrawal of troops is due to take place next Monday or Tuesday, Israeli television reported, quoting a leading Israeli official.

But violence on the ground showed little sign of abating as an Israeli raid in Gaza City killed four Palestinians.

Hamas founder Sheikh Ahmed Yassin told Reuters yesterday his group had decided to suspend attacks on Israelis.

“Hamas has studied all the developments and has reached a decision to call a truce, or a suspension of fighting activities.” He said the cease-fire carried conditions and a time frame but declined to give details or indicate when a truce would be announced.

“We are still in contact with the rest of the factions in order to reach a joint formula to be signed by everybody,” Yassin said, referring to groups such as Islamic Jihad and the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades of the mainstream Fatah movement.

A senior official of the Hamas movement earlier said the truce document will be released within the next few days. “There is a shared document, which reflects a shared position, and was agreed on by Hamas, Jihad and Fatah. It will be announced very soon, within a few days,” Abdul Aziz Al-Rantissi told AFP, adding that Hamas “prepared the document.”

Rantissi said the three factions now needed to inform Arafat’s “Palestinian Authority, our brothers in Egypt and other concerned parties.”

For his part, senior Islamic Jihad leader Mohammed Al-Hindi told AFP his group was “inclined toward quiet”, adding its final decision would come “within two days.”

“We will announce our final decision on a shared (truce) document with Fatah and Hamas within two days,” he said.

Hindi described the document as proposing “a three-month (truce) conditional on (Israel’s) stopping assassinations and raids.”

According to an AFP correspondent who saw a draft of the agreement on Thursday, the introduction stresses the need for a period of calm.

“The Palestinian organizations announce the suspension of their operations against Israel for three months in exchange for a cessation of Israeli assassinations of Palestinians, an end to incursions, a release of prisoners and an end to house demolitions,” the text says. The document also says that Hamas and other factions who oppose the road map would not “obstruct the political process, short of endorsing it.”

A truce would be one of the first steps toward the implementation of the US-backed document that aims to end the violence and then create a Palestinian state by 2005.

Hamas, Fatah and Islamic Jihad, among other factions, have been discussing a truce for weeks, following a proposal by Palestinian Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas.

Some of their meetings took place in Cairo with the mediation of Egypt’s security chief Omar Suleiman.

A Fatah official said Thursday that the draft had been hammered out at a meeting of Fatah representatives and the exiled leadership of Hamas and Islamic Jihad in Damascus last week.

Also involved in the negotiations were the field commanders of various groups, the leadership of the various factions as well as Palestinian prisoners held in Israeli jails.

In Tel Aviv, a senior Israeli political source said an agreement had been reached on troop withdrawal.

A Palestinian official, who declined to be identified, also said: “An agreement has been reached on the issue of the (Israeli) withdrawal from Gaza and Bethlehem in the meeting that took place today between Israeli and Palestinian security officials.”

Meanwhile, heavy fighting between Israeli troops and Palestinians in Gaza City early yesterday left four Palestinians dead after troops moved in to arrest a wanted member of the Hamas group, Palestinian security sources and Hamas said.

The target, Adnan Al-Ghoul, a senior member of Hamas’ armed wing, the Ezzedine Al-Qassam Brigades, escaped unharmed, but his son and nephew were killed when troops demolished Ghoul’s house.

Ghoul’s son, Mohammed, 24, was crushed to death as troops razed the building. The body of Ghoul’s nephew, Imran, 33, was also found under the rubble, medical sources said. Both were also members of the Ezzedine Al-Qassam Brigades.

— Additional input from Agencies