GAZA, June 8: Three Palestinian militant groups banded together for a rare joint attack that killed four Israeli soldiers on Sunday, in defiance of peace pledges Palestinian Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas made at a Middle East summit.

Three gunmen from Hamas, Islamic Jihad and the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades disguised themselves as Israeli soldiers before attacking an army post near the Erez crossing between Israel and the Gaza Strip, the military said. All three Palestinians were shot dead in the gunbattle.

The assault was another slap in the face by Palestinian hardliners to Abbas and his efforts to make good on a promise to demilitarise the 32-month-old uprising for statehood, threatening to strangle the latest peace moves almost at birth.

The militants oppose the decisons taken at landmark summits which US President George W. Bush held in Aqaba, Jordan on Wednesday with Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and with Arab leaders in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt a day earlier.

Participants at the two gatherings endorsed a US-backed “road map” for Israeli-Palestinian peace which calls for an end to violence and the start of reciprocal confidence-building steps leading to the creation of a Palestinian state in 2005.

Abbas called at the Aqaba summit for attacks on Israelis to cease. The plea was rejected by militant groups which announced they were ending truce talks with Abbas.—Reuters