CAIRO: An Israeli delegation arrived in Cairo on Tuesday for indirect talks with Palestinians on a long-term Gaza truce, hours after Israeli soldiers killed two suspects in the June murder of three Jewish teenagers.

The Israeli army operation in the West Bank city of Hebron in which the two Palestinians died in an exchange of fire had threatened to derail the scheduled negotiations in Cairo.

Israel says the militants, Amer Abu Eisha and Marwan Qawasmeh, were behind the murder of the teenagers that led to weeks of simmering violence which culminated in a 50-day war between Israel and Hamas militants in Gaza.

Senior Hamas negotiator Ezzat al-Rishq told AFP the Palestinian team had been headed to the headquarters of the Egyptian intelligence service which mediates the talks when they learned of the Hebron incident and had turned back in protest.

“The talks have been delayed by two hours,” Rishq said, condemning what he called the "assassination" of Abu Eisha and Qawasmeh.

The Israeli delegation arrived earlier on Tuesday, said an official at Cairo airport.

Tuesday's meeting is expected to set a timetable for further negotiations after the Muslim Eidul Azha holiday in the first week of October, a Palestinian official said.

On August 26, both sides reached a ceasefire that ended the Gaza conflict, which killed more than 2,140 Palestinians, most of them civilians, and 73 on the Israeli side, mostly soldiers, with an agreement to start negotiations in a month on unresolved issues.

These include the construction of a seaport and restoring the territory's airport, and exchanging Palestinian prisoners for the remains of Israeli soldiers.

Hamas, a militant movement designated as a terrorist group by the United States, Israel and the European Union, will also hold separate negotiations in Cairo with the Fatah faction of Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas.

The factions agreed a unity government in June to end a seven-year rift that left Hamas in control of Gaza, but the Islamists remain the de facto rulers of the coastal enclave.

The talks will focus on the transfer of power in Gaza to the national unity government and on security in the enclave, a member of the Fatah delegation said.

Israel troops kill 2 Palestinian suspects in teens murder: army

Israeli troops on Tuesday killed two Palestinians named as suspects in the June murder of three Jewish teenagers in the West Bank that sparked a deadly spiral of tit-for-tat violence.

The murders culminated in a 50-day, full-scale war between Israel and the Palestinian movement Hamas in Gaza that claimed more than 2,200 lives.

Amer Abu Eisha and Marwan Qawasmeh, whom Israel had accused of carrying out the kidnappings and murders, were killed “in an exchange of fire” in the southern West Bank city of Hebron, the army said.

The two men were in a house in Hebron and gunfire broke out during an arrest operation by the Shin Bet internal security services and the army's anti-terror unit, it indicated in a statement.

Residents told AFP they heard an exchange of fire during the assault, and that the army had also broken down the doors of several shops in the area.

Local youths threw stones at the soldiers near the scene of the raid, and following the shooting, a general strike was being observed across the city.

The suspects “no longer pose a threat to Israeli civilians,” army spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Peter Lerner said on Twitter, posting pictures of the two men.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu praised the operation, saying the suspects had been “dealt with." “I said that whoever perpetrated the kidnapping and murder of our boys would bear the consequences... that we would pursue the enemy, find them and not return until they had been dealt with,” he said in a statement.

Rachel Frenkel, the mother of 16-year-old victim Naftali Frenkel, said she was relieved not to have to face the killers in court. “I'm not all that sorry that I won't encounter their laughing faces in a courtroom,” she told army radio.

The army had already partially destroyed the two men's homes on July 1, a day after the teenagers' bodies were found. The demolitions were completed in August.

The June abduction of Frenkel, Gilad Shaer and Eyal Yifrach from a hitchhiking stop near Hebron sparked a huge Israeli search operation in which hundreds of Palestinians were arrested and at least five killed. Israel immediately blamed the kidnappings on Hamas militants.

The revenge killing by Jewish extremists of Palestinian teenager Mohammed Abu Khder in July led to a surge in tensions that helped trigger the war in and around Gaza that ended on August 26.

Earlier this month, Israel charged the prime suspect in the teens' murders, Hossam Qawasmeh, with organising and financing the operation.