The Israeli army briefly entered a Palestinian-ruled area of the West Bank city of Ramallah today to respond to fire by Palestinian gunmen, the army said in a statement.
Two Israeli soldiers and one Palestinian police officer were wounded in the massive gun battle. The gunfight erupted after Palestinians fired on an Israeli army jeep near Ramallah, lightly wounding the two soldiers, an army spokeswoman said.
The army said it had briefly entered a Palestinian-ruled area of the city with a tank and an armoured personnel carrier to respond to the Palestinian fire.
The fighting erupted just before Israeli police stormed a mosque compound in Jerusalem's Old City, where Jews commemorated the anniversary of the destruction of the two biblical temples with a day of fast and worship at the Western Wall.
Hundreds of police entered the site where a Palestinian uprising erupted 10 months ago after Palestinians threw stones from the Temple Mount, sacred to Muslims as al-Haram alSharif, on to Jewish worshippers below.
Israeli-Palestinian violence has raged virtually without stopping since the uprising started last September after peace talks stalled. Nearly 500 Palestinians and more than 100 Israelis have been killed.