Israel kills suspects in teen settler deaths

Israeli army says it has killed two men suspected of fatal abduction of three youths in the occupied West Bank in June. An Israeli army spokesman has said two Palestinians suspected of the fatal abduction of three Israeli teenage settlers in June have been killed in a shootout with Israeli forces. Lieutenant Colonel Peter Lerner said the suspects, Marwan Qawasmeh, 33, and Amer Abu Aisheh, 29, were killed in the occupied West Bank on Tuesday. "We opened fire, they returned fire and they were killed in the exchange," said Lerner. "We have visual confirmation for one. The second one, we have no visual confirmation, but the assumption is he was killed." Abu Eisheh's mother told Al Jazeera that she had heard the news, but she could not confirm the deaths. Qawasmeh's mother told local media that she wanted to know whether he was killed and that she hoped he was martyred. Al Jazeera's Rania Zabaneh, reporting from Ramallah, said that hospitals in Hebron had not received any bodies, but locals said they had seen two bodies. "Six other Palestinians were arrested," said Zabaneh, adding that a huge Israeli force was still surrounding the Hebron University neighbourhood where the confrontations erupted. "The Israeli forces, according to local sources in Hebron are bombing doors open, they can see a bulldozer and spot smoke in the area - but are not able to approach," she said. Massive manhunt The abduction of Jewish seminary students - Eyal Yifrach, 19, and 16-year-olds Gilad Shaer and Naftali Fraenkel - in the West Bank sparked a massive manhunt. It led to the arrest of hundreds of activists of the Hamas movement, eventually sparking Israel's summer offensive against Gaza. The bodies of the three Israelis were found three weeks later and a suspected mastermind was arrested. But the two main suspects believed to have abducted and killed the teens had remained fugitives.