World pushes Bush, he pleads Peres to pull out

After the speech, Israel said it would let US West Asia envoy Anthony Zinni meet Arafat. Prime Minister Ariel Sharon earlier barred Zinni and other envoys from the United Nations, European Union and Russia from seeing Arafat.

‘‘The Prime minister has decided to allow the American envoy to meet the chairman of the Palestinian Authority in accordance with the request of the General,’’ spokesman Raanan Gissin said.

With shooting reported on Thursday around the traditional birthplace of Jesus in Bethlehem, Pope John Paul called for a world day of prayer on Sunday for peace in West Asia ‘‘to change the hearts of even the most obstinate men’’.

Israeli tanks rolled into Nablus and Hebron on Thursday in the latest thrust of an offensive launched last Friday after a Palestinian suicide bomber killed 26 Israelis at a Passover dinner.

Witnesses in the northern city of Jenin said Israeli tanks were shelling a nearby refugee camp, destroying at least two houses.

Israel’s right-wing Public Security Minister Uzi Landau lent support to the Palestinian thesis when he told Army radio: ‘‘We have to spur on the Army deeper, stronger, sharper, to overthrow the Palestinian Authority as fast as possible.’’

‘‘The storms of violence cannot go on,’’ Bush said. ‘‘Enough is enough.’’ But he had little good to say about Palestinian President Yasser Arafat, saying: ‘‘The situation in which he finds himself today is largely of his own making’’.

In Brussels, European Commission president Romano Prodi said Israel was systematically destroying Arafat’s Palestinian Authority and the situation in West Asia was deteriorating ‘‘at frightening speed’’.

In Lebanon, protestors took to the streets to denounce Israel’s raids. In Jakarta, some 2,000 Indonesians hit the streets calling for an end to Israeli military action.

Saudi Arabia reminded its people of a ban on public demonstrations after an impromptu protest by 150 angry citizens in support of the Palestinians, the Saudi Press Agency said.

However, Prince Bandar bin Sultan, the Saudi ambassador to the US, said the crisis in West Asia will be to Israel what the Vietnam War was to the US — it may win battles but would ultimately lose the war.

The Moroccan government granted schoolchildren early spring holidays in a bid to prevent possible violent pro-Palestinian street protests, a government official said.