"In our point of view, it is still possible and should be settled in peaceful manner," Zavershinsky stressed. "What is better for world community? If nothing else, there must be a kind of a dialogue with Iran, or it will isolate itself and face sanctions that will make settlement impossible."

"Let's look at the map and think, what will happen if nuclear weapons are used in the region. It will be razed to the ground: problems of Palestine, Israel, Iran and Iraq will be "solved" simultaneously. That is why our diplomats try to keep the Iranian partners within the frames of diplomatic settlement of the problem," Zavershinsky concluded.


However, on Tuesday Iranian nuclear negotiators ended in Moscow without any progress on proposal to enrich Iranian uranium on Russian soil. Tehran said it will consider a joint venture with Russia, and possibly others, to enrich uranium for power stations. But it reserves the right to pursue enrichment at home as well.

Talks are due to continue in Iran soon.

Iran recently announced it was restarting uranium enrichment work but insists it is interested only in civilian nuclear power. The United States and the European Union suspect Iran's program is aimed at eventually making atomic weapons.

The United States and the EU trio of Britain, France and Germany may refer Iran to the U.N. Security Council for sanctions after a March 6 meeting of the IAEA reports on Iran.

China has called on Iran to suspend all uranium enrichment. But it has also repeatedly appealed for a diplomatic solution to the crisis instead of sanctions while deepening economic ties.

China National Heavy-Duty Truck Corp. on Tuesday signed a contract to provide 10,000 trucks to Iran for $350 million, Xinhua said on Thursday.

Booming China became a net exporter of vehicles for the first time last year, mostly through focusing on cheap models focused on developing markets like the Middle East.

Last week, China and Iran were reportedly on the verge of finalizing a multi-billion dollar agreement to develop a major oilfield in Iran.

China is one of Iran's biggest oil export markets, importing roughly 300,000 barrels of Iranian crude a day.

Iran and Russia are discussing a Russian offer to enrich uranium for Iranian power plants on its own soil -- seen by some as a last chance to defuse the row over Iran's nuclear ambitions before Western governments seek sanctions.

Six million Jews were killed by the Nazis during World War II.

Mr Shahar said he wanted the German federal prosecutors' office to take the issue before the constitutional court in the hope that international arrest warrants would be issued against Mr Ahmadinejad.

Correspondents say prosecutors will have to consider whether Germany has jurisdiction and whether President Ahmadinejad enjoys immunity.

International case

"I'm awaiting a response about whether they will file charges but I don't know how long it will take," Mr Shahar told the Reuters news agency.

"It doesn't take days but several months."

On Monday, British historian David Irving was found guilty in Austria of denying the Holocaust and sentenced to three years in prison.

He had pleaded guilty to the charge, based on a speech and interview he gave in Austria in 1989.

Although Mr Ahmadinejad did not deny the Holocaust on German soil, another law passed in 2005 permits the filing of international cases in German courts.

Mr Shahar hopes the case might result in international warrants for Mr Ahmadinejad's arrest, thus preventing the president from entering the US or Europe.

The lawyer believes Germany is the best country in which to file the suit, because it is the "most influential European state" and because the country is directly linked to the case.

The prosecutors' office in Karlsruhe has not yet commented.

In the latest violence, soldiers shot dead two men after Palestinians threw rocks and petrol bombs, the medics said. One of the men was aged 18 and the other, 24.

The Israeli army said troops fired at Palestinians who either shot at them or threw fire bombs. The Israeli gunfire hit at least three Palestinians, the army added.

Witnesses said the confrontations began after the army expanded the scope of the operation from Balata refugee camp, on the outskirts of Nablus, into the city center, blocking main roads and forcing schools and some businesses to close.

An Israeli military official in Jerusalem said troops were searching the Nablus area for militants suspected of involvement in planning suicide bombings and other attacks. The official did not say how long the operation would last.

The main targets of the raid have been Islamic Jihad, which carried out two suicide bombings in Israel in recent months, and al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, a militant group that is part of the mainstream
Fatah movement.

More than two dozen militants have been arrested in the Nablus area and elsewhere in the West Bank since the operation began on Saturday, Israeli military sources said.

Palestinians said more than 50 people had been shot and injured by the army during confrontations, some by live ammunition and others by rubber-coated metal bullets.

In Gaza, Islamic Jihad militants said they fired seven rockets at Israel in response to the Nablus operation, in which a senior commander in the group was killed on Tuesday. The army said five rockets struck in Israel, causing no casualties.

The Hashemites have ruled since the king's great-grandfather, Abdullah I, became Emir of Trans-Jordan in 1921.

Gen Naveh, the head of the Israeli army's Central Command, sent a letter of apology to his Jordanian counterpart on Thursday morning.

In his letter, he said he was sorry "if my comments upset the Jordanian people and King Abdullah II", Israeli army radio reported.

Speaking at a lecture to journalists and diplomats at the Jerusalem Centre for Public Affairs on Wednesday, Gen Naveh said an "Islamist axis" was threatening to envelop Jordan.

He said the axis comprised Iran, "which proclaims its desire to destroy Israel", Iraq, "where no one knows what might happen", and the Palestinian territories, where the Palestinian Islamist militant group, Hamas, won last month's legislative elections.

"Given that Jordan is 80% Palestinian, we might - heaven forbid - reach a situation in which Abdullah is the last Hashemite king," he said.

Jordan has a large population of citizens of Palestinian origin who left homes in what is now Israel and the occupied territories, although few observers put the percentage as high as Gen Naveh.

'Promising future'

The Jordanian charge d'affaires in Israel, Omar al-Nadif, criticised Gen Naveh's prediction, warning the remarks would harm relations between Jordan and Israel if "appropriate action" was not taken.

Israeli Defence Minister Shaul Mofaz and Israeli army Chief of Staff Dan Halutz have issued a joint statement stressing the comments did not reflect Israel's position and demanding an immediate inquiry into the issue.

"Israel views Jordan as a strong, stable country, with a glorious heritage and promising future," it said.

"Israel wishes to express respect and appreciation for the Hashemite Kingdom's vital contribution to regional stability and peace."

It is not clear if the statement has placated Amman. Correspondents say the Jordanians want Gen Naveh's resignation.

In addition, Gen Naveh said a Hamas-led Palestinian Authority risked becoming an "enemy state".

"One should understand very clearly what the leaders of Hamas say and take them seriously. They have every intention of throwing us into the sea, doing it step by step and getting others to do their dirty work for them."

As soon as they were married they applied to the Israeli Interior Ministry for "family unification." Despite promises, including written promises, she is still waiting for the residency document. They've been through a lot of Kafkaesque travails as a result, but the new prohibition against going home together shocked even them. They thought it might have been a soldier's whim, but a news item in Haaretz last Friday made clear to them that it is a military order, signed by Maj. Gen. Yair Naveh, commander of the IDF in the Judea and Samaria region. The order forbids Palestinians from entering Israel via any route other than 11 special crossings that were allocated only to them - and they can only cross those on foot. Palestinians are not allowed to drive inside Israel. The order also prohibits Israelis from bringing Palestinians into Israel through passages designated for Israelis only.

At the Hizma junction, which is for Israelis only, the "seam administration of the Defense Ministry has not yet hung the signs that it already hung on the road leading from the settlement of Ma'aleh Adumim to Jerusalem. The signs are hung alongside the road and at the military checkpoint, and say, in Hebrew and Arabic, "Passage is for Israelis only. Transporting and/or movement of people who are not Israelis is forbidden through this passage."

The yellow signs explain who is an Israeli. The definition is in the major general's order, and is the standard definition used in military orders declaring "a closed military area" to Palestinians, where only Israelis are allowed to enter. "An Israeli," says the order and the sign, "is a resident of Israel, someone whose residency is in the region [meaning the occupied territory - A.H.] and is an Israeli citizen [a settler - A.H.] or one who is eligible to become an immigrant according to the Law of Return-1950 and someone who is not a resident of the region but has a valid entry permit to Israel [a tourist - A.H.]

A military source confirmed to Haaretz that a decision has been made to allow Palestinians who work for international organizations to travel, with their foreign co-workers, through two passages designated for Israelis only "instead of making them go to the ends of the earth" to passages designated for Palestinians only. The problem with the separate passages is not only that they are remote and distant, as the military source admits; the problem is not only the wasted time involved in reaching those passages, the revolving doors that suddenly are locked, the humiliating crowdedness, the alienating technological devices or that most of the "passages" effectively legitimize more land expropriation and annexation of Palestinian territory to Israel. The problem is that they are another building block in the policy of separate development for Jews and non-Jews, another expression of the mentality that cloaks itself in security but whose real purpose is to preserve the hegemonic privileges of Jews, at the expense of the Palestinians in the territories conquered from them.

This policy of separate development of two demographic groups in the same territorial region - the occupied West Bank, where the Israeli army is the sovereign - began with the first settlement. It continued and deepened as the settlements proliferated and grew into separate demographic-territorial pockets where Israeli law, which does not apply to the original inhabitants of the area, is in force.

The residents of those territorial pockets also won extra rights, which are denied to the native neighbors and the non-Jewish citizens of Israel. Like the right to choose where they want to live, on both sides of the Green Line. Protected by the superiority of the ruling military force, territorial borders were set and bureaucratic limits were placed that a priori limit the separate development of the native Palestinians: The area available to them is gradually shrinking, water quotas are dwindling in comparison with what is made available to Jews, freedom of movement is limited, and economic development is shackled and controlled.

With time, and with international accommodation and the increase in the number of Israelis who benefit from the system, the settlements are being transformed from "Israeli territorial pockets" to Jewish territorial contiguity, in which there are poor, rights deprived, over croweded and inferior "populated pockets" of the Palestinians.

A comparison between flourishing Pisgat Ze'ev on the lands of Hizma and Anata with Hizma and Anata, hemmed in and suffocating behind a horrendous cement wall, proves that the policy of separate development began long before the suicide bombings and the rise of Hamas.

A UN Security Council resolution has threatened further action unless Syria co-operates fully with the probe.

Mr Brammertz's spokeswoman said he had held "a good meeting" with Syrian officials, but did not say who they were.

"He held a working meeting with Syrian officials in which old and new issues of co-operation were discussed," Nasrat Hasan said.

Earlier, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice increased international pressure on Syria by insisting on "full co-operation" with the UN investigation.

"Full co-operation means the Syrians should co-operate in any way the investigators of Mr Brammertz think necessary," she told reporters during a brief visit to the Lebanese capital, Beirut.

Mr Brammertz, the former deputy prosecutor of the International Criminal Court in The Hague, replaced German magistrate Detlev Mehlis as head of the UN investigation in January.

Mr Muallim succeeded Farouk al-Sharaa as Syrian foreign minister on 11 February after Mr Sharaa was appointed vice-president.