"The state of alert in the country over fears of an Iraqi attack will remain in force for at least a further two weeks," Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom, in Washington for a series of meetings with the US government, told the daily Yediot Aharonot.

The minister's estimate came after talks with US President George W. Bush, and as US troops closed in on Baghdad.

US officials say Iraqi President Saddam Hussein could use chemical weapons against US and British troops as they move on Baghdad, or even try to fire Scud missiles against Israel as he did in the 1991 Gulf war.

On Tuesday, Defence Minister Shaul Mofaz had also said the state of alert would not be lifted.

"When we are sure that the threat of missile attacks has passed -- but it has not and the threat still exists -- we will review the state of alert," Mofaz said.

Israelis have prepared sealed rooms as a protection in the event of chemical or biological attack, and have been instructed to carry gas masks with them whenever they leave their homes.

The press reported this week that two elderly sisters suffocated in a sealed room, apparently fearing a Scud attack. Last month, an Arab Israeli woman and her two teenage sons died in similar circumstances.

As Israel remained on stand-by for an attack from the embattled Iraqi regime, reports emerged that new efforts were being made to ease the 30-month conflict with the Palestinians which has claimed more than 3,000 lives, most of them Palestinians.

The first high-level security talks in months were held last week between delegations headed by General Doron Almog, head of the Israeli army's southern command, and General Abdelrazak al-Majaida, head of Palestinian security in the Gaza Strip, the Maariv daily said.

There was no official confirmation from either side.

The meeting was held as part of efforts by moderate new Palestinian prime minister Mahmud Abbas to form a government to tackle the protracted crisis.

Abbas has called for a suspension of attacks on Israel, a move that has so far been publicly rejected by hardline factions.

During the meeting, the Palestinian delegation reportedly asked Israel to halt its hunt-and-kill policy against wanted militants as well as its often bloody incursions into the Gaza Strip.

Almog said Israel was ready to re-examine its operations if the Palestinian security forces, which in Gaza are still largely intact, take action against the powerful militant groups to end the attacks on Israel and Jewish settlements in the territory, Maariv said.

The last such security meeting was in August 2002, when the two sides aired the so-called Bethlehem-Gaza First plan, under which Israel agreed to pull back from reoccupied areas in return for Palestinian forces taking charge of security.

The agreement broke down in November after a suicide bomber based in Bethlehem blew up a Jerusalem bus, killing 11 people.

Despite the reported talks, an Israeli armoured column supported by two helicopters entered the Tulkarem refugee camp in the West Bank, firing machine guns and rockets, residents and Palestinian security sources said.

Troops advanced on the camp as the helicopters fired several rockets at unidentified targets, but no casualties were reported.

Israeli military sources confirmed to AFP that a swoop to arrest suspected Palestinian activists was underway in the camp but denied that rockets had been fired.

Also on Wednesday morning, in Hebron, in the southern West Bank, the Israeli army demolished the home of Omar Hamdan Abu Sneineh, a member of an armed group close to Yasser Arafat's Fatah movement accused of involvement in several anti-Israeli attacks in the area, an army spokesman said.

And the death toll continued to rise when a 14-year-old Palestinian boy succcumbed to wounds sustained during Israeli firing in Ramallah last week, and two masked gunmen shot dead a Palestinian suspected of collaborating with Israel.

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