The attack was the first against Israelis in nearly four weeks and was a carbon copy of an ambush on the same spot near this settlement in the northern West Bank that left 11 Israelis dead last December.

Officials said the bombs sent the bus crashing into an electricity pylon at the entrance to the Emmanuel settlement, which is located halfway between the West Bank towns of Nablus and Qalqilya. The latest carnage, claimed by three different groups, came hours before US, UN, European Union and Russian officials met in New York in hopes of fleshing out a US plan to end the conflict and create an eventual Palestinian state.

The diplomatic “quartet” endorsed US President George W. Bush’s call for a Palestinian state within three years, but its members were sharply divided over his demand for the ouster of Palestinian President Yasser Arafat.

The United States found itself isolated on two key Middle East issues yesterday as its partners in the international diplomatic “quartet” differed sharply with its stance on Arafat and the pace of Israel’s response to Palestinian reforms.

UN chief Kofi Annan, Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov and Danish Foreign Minister Per Stig Moeller, representing the European Union, told reporters they all stood behind the beleaguered Palestinian leader despite Bush’s call for his ouster. “We all share the end objective of two states living in peace, side by side,” Annan said. “What we have to do is to work out how we get there, what is the operational pathway that gets us to that goal in three years’ time.”

“As for Arafat, we all have our respective positions; the UN still recognizes Chairman Arafat, and we will continue to deal with him until the Palestinians decide otherwise,” Annan said.

Ivanov and Moeller echoed those remarks. “It’s only for the Palestinian people to decide who they want to have as their leader,” Ivanov said. “It is the sovereign right of the Palestinian people. As for Chairman Arafat, he is the legitimately elected leader of Palestine, and while he is in this capacity, we will continue to maintain our relations with him,” he said.

Moeller shared those sympathies but did not mention Arafat by name. “We talk to the leader of the Palestinian people,” said Moeller, whose country took over the rotating EU presidency earlier this month. “It is up to the Palestinian people to decide who is their leader,” he said, looking forward to Palestinian elections that are set for early next year. “We will have an election, and then we will see who will become leader after the elections. Whoever is leader is the person the European Union is talking to,” Moeller said.

Israeli officials said the bus ambush boded ill for the New York talks and showed that Arafat’s promises to reform his Palestinian Authority were a sham. “The Palestinians are back at their old murderous game of trying to kill as many Israelis and as many Jews as they possibly can,” government spokesman Arye Mekel told reporters.

Israel also postponed plans to renew talks with the Palestinian Authority officials on humanitarian issues. “For such a dialogue to take place, a certain calm must prevail on the ground, and that is not the currently the case,” an official said.

The attack drew condemnation from the quartet members and elsewhere in the international community. The United States said it provided new justification for its call to replace Arafat. “This underscores the importance of focusing on peace and working with leaders in the Palestinian Authority who are dedicated to peace,” said White House spokesman Ari Fleischer.