Gunman kills 8 in Jerusalem Jewish college

By Alastair Macdonald and Jeffrey Heller

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - A Palestinian gunman killed eight people in a Jewish religious college in Jerusalem on Thursday, most of them students, and wounded about 10 others in the most lethal attack in Israel in two years.

The attacker was shot dead by an off-duty Israeli soldier.

"It was a slaughterhouse," said Yehuda Meshi-Zahav, head of the Zaka emergency service, after surveying the scene following five minutes of bloodshed at the Merkaz Harav seminary, one of the most prominent Jewish educational centers in the holy city.

Jerusalem police chief Aharon Franco said the lone gunman was killed by an off-duty army officer who lives nearby and ran to the school after hearing gunfire. A city official said the assailant carried documents identifying him as a resident of Arab East Jerusalem.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack, but it was greeted with celebrations in the Gaza Strip, where an Israeli offensive in recent days killed more than 120 Palestinians, about half of whom were identified as civilians.

Outside the seminary, young Orthodox Jews in traditional black costume chanted periodically "Death to Arabs!"

Shortly before the shooting, Egyptian officials ended inconclusive talks with leaders of Gaza's ruling Hamas Islamist movement, part of a U.S.-backed push for a truce between Gaza militants and Israel to halt a surge in violence.

Earlier in the day, an Israeli soldier was killed in a bomb attack in Gaza and four Gaza militants died in an air strike.

INTERNATIONAL CONDEMNATION

The United Nations, Washington, France, Britain and Germany all condemned the school shooting in the heart of Jewish West Jerusalem and the U.N. Security Council prepared to discuss the attack at an extraordinary session late on Thursday in New York.

The United States proposed the Council condemn it as a "terrorist attack" -- language Arab states have resisted before.

An Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman said "terrorists are trying to destroy the chances of peace but we will certainly continue peace talks" with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.

The Palestinian leader also condemned the Jerusalem attack.

Police said the gunman walked freely into the yard of the school, a modern 5-storey complex, shot dead a guard and then sprayed bullets from an AK-47 rifle and a pistol at young men marking a festive period with study in a ground-floor library.

Most of the dead were in their 20s, police said.