JENIN, West Bank -- Undercover Israeli troops raided an internet cafe in the West Bank on Tuesday and killed an 18-year-old Palestinian man during a gunbattle, witnesses and medics said, Reuters reported.

Earlier on Tuesday, armed Jewish settlers opened fire on Palestinian stone throwers in the West Bank and seriously wounded a 14-year-old Palestinian boy, medics said.

The Israeli Army said two soldiers were slightly wounded when a special forces unit descended on Assil, a popular Internet hangout in the northern city of Jenin, where they arrested seven suspected Palestinian activists after a shootout.

Palestinian witnesses said the dead man, Hissam Mahmoud Amr, was not a militant and neither were four of the six Palestinians wounded during the clash. An Islamic Jihad activist, the cafe owner and a policeman were among those arrested, they said.

Witnesses said troops in jeeps, tanks and other armored vehicles followed the undercover unit into the district and imposed a curfew, a common tactic against activists which Palestinians criticize as collective punishment.

The army reported 45 arrests of Palestinians around the West Bank over the previous 24 hours, adding to the many thousands rounded up since the start of a Palestinian uprising for independence in September 2000.

Israeli-Palestinian violence has persisted despite U.S. calls for restraint in the run-up to a possible war on Iraq.

Israel drew rare U.S. criticism for an army raid in the Gaza Strip on Monday which killed eight Palestinians, including a pregnant woman crushed under rubble of her home after troops blew up a nearby house belonging to the family of an activist.

Palestinian boy shot in clash with settlers.

Armed Jewish settlers opened fire on Palestinian stone-throwers in a Palestinian village near the West Bank city of Nablus, seriously wounding a 14-year-old boy, Palestinian medics and officials said.

The medics said Bassam Al-Khatib was shot in the stomach by settlers firing at stone-throwers in the village of Asawya near the West Bank city of Nablus.

The boy was in serious condition in a Nablus hospital after the clash, which village officials said followed attacks on several Palestinian homes in the area on Monday night by settlers from the nearby enclave of Eli.

Israeli media said the settlers were passing through the village in a car. Israeli police said they were investigating.

Palestinian militants have frequently targeted Jewish settlers in territories Israel took in the 1967 Middle East War. Most of the international community considers the settlements illegal but Israeli disputes this.

Armed settlers have occasionally attacked Palestinians and damaged their property, including olive groves.

On Monday, troops battled Palestinian gunmen, arrested a co-founder of the Islamic activist group Hamas and demolished homes in the Gaza refugee camp of Bureij.