Israeli Soldiers Kill West Bank Settler

Israeli soldiers shot dead a settler and wounded two others when they opened fire on a car at a roadblock in the West Bank on Friday, the army said.

"Soldiers who had been warned of a suspicious vehicle opened fire, killing one Israeli and wounding two others," a military spokesman told Agence France Presse.

The car, driving from the Beit Hagai settlement towards Hebron, had failed to stop at a barrier specially erected to intercept it following an alert, the spokesman said.

According to media reports, the dead man was a 60-year-old resident of the nearby settlement of Othniel on his way to morning prayers at the Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron.

While the army was treating the casualties at the scene, a Palestinian truck passing by lightly wounded a soldier but, according to the spokesman, the military believes the act was not intentional.

Palestinians have been the victims of similar shootings in the past, accusing Israeli soldiers of opening fire without warning on vehicles they consider suspect.

The army has opened a probe into Friday's incident.

Last week, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's inner cabinet decided to speed up construction of Jewish settlements in annexed Arab east Jerusalem and elsewhere in the West Bank, a day after the U.N. cultural organization UNESCO accepted Palestine as a full member.