Ehud Olmert, the Israeli prime minister, has likened a rampage by armed Jewish settlers in a Palestinian village to a "pogrom" and said Israel would not tolerate such attacks in the occupied West Bank.

"In the state of Israel, there will be no pogroms against
non-Jews," Olmert said at the start of a weekly cabinet meeting on Sunday.

Olmert's comments referred to an attack by Jewish settlers from the Yetsahir settlement on Saturday against Palestinians in the village of Asira al-Kabaliya.

Three Palestinians were shot and wounded in the settlers' attack, medical officials said.

Dozens of settlers, some firing weapons, assaulted Palestinians and damaged houses in the village. No arrests have been made.

The incident followed the stabbing of a nine-year-old boy by a Palestinian in a nearby Jewish outpost earlier in the day. His wounds were not life-threatening.

'Intolerable phenomenon'

"This is an intolerable phenomenon and it will be dealt with in the strongest way by Israel's law enforcement authorities," Olmert said.

Mohammed Arouf, the president of Asira al-Kabaliya, said on Israel Radio:"The settlers started to throw stones at houses.

"They broke windows and shot at people here and there who came out of their homes to try to protect their neighbours."

Yigal Amitai, a spokesman for the nearby Yitzhak settlement, said the Palestinian who stabbed the boy had come from Asira al-Kabaliya.

Asked whether Yitzhar settlers had taken the law into their own hands, he said: "I think it is time for Israel to stop playing the victim, and start being the aggressor."

Zehava Galon, a legislator from Israel's left-wing Meretz party, accused Israeli authorities of failing for years to punish settlers who break the law.

'Law of the jungle'

Amos Harel, the military affairs correspondent for Israel's Haaretz newspaper, said the "law of the jungle" applied in the West Bank.

Yitzhak settlers are being accused of taking the law into their own hands [AFP]