ISRAELI occupation forces killed two Palestinians, including a 15-year-old boy, today as they rampaged through the West Bank, ostensibly searching for three teenagers feared captured near Hebron.

Two other Palestinians were seriously wounded by army gunfire during raids in four towns and refugee camps.

The two Palestinians killed yesterday raised to three the number of Palestinians shot dead by troops during search operations this week.

The three Jewish seminary students, one of whom is an Israeli Defence Force member, disappeared on June 12, while hitchhiking in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.

Israel has blamed the Islamic militant Hamas group for the apparent abduction but has offered no proof.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has exploited the military operation to promote two other objectives — a new crackdown on Hamas and an attempt to discredit the Palestinian unity government formed earlier this month by Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and supported by Hamas.

President Abbas denounced the seizure of the three on Wednesday, telling an Organisation of Islamic Co-operation meeting in Saudi Arabia: “Those who kidnapped the three teenagers want to destroy us.”

He said that his organisation was working with Israel to help find the missing teenagers, one of whom also holds US citizenship.

“They are human beings and we are looking for them and we will hold their kidnappers accountable, whoever they are,” he said.

Thousands of Israeli troops have searched hundreds of locations in the West Bank over the past week, seizing more than 300 Palestinians, many from Hamas.

A senior Israeli intelligence officer said yesterday that anyone linked to Hamas was potentially a target.