REPORT: Netanyahu speaks to Abbas about three abducted Israeli teens

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on Monday and said he expected him to help in efforts to find three Israeli teenagers abducted in the occupied West Bank.      

"I expect you to help in the return of the kidnapped youngsters and in catching the abductors," a statement issued by the prime minister's office quoted Netanyahu as telling Abbas in a telephone call.        

On Sunday, Gilad Erdan, a minister in Netanyahu's security cabinet, told Israeli television that Abbas's security forces were "willingly" helping search for the teenagers.        

A statement on Monday by Abbas's office made no mention of the conversation with Netanyahu. But it said the "Palestinian presidency condemns ... the kidnapping of three Israeli boys and the series of Israeli violations" -- a reference to Israeli military raids and arrests since they disappeared on Thursday. 

Israeli forces searching for three teenagers believed to have been kidnapped swept into a second West Bank city on Monday, touching off street confrontations in which they killed a Palestinian, witnesses and hospital officials said.          

The bloodshed near the de facto Palestinian capital of Ramallah marked an escalation in a dragnet targeting Hamas, an Islamist group which earlier this month agreed to form a unity government with U.S.-backed Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.       

Witnesses said Palestinians threw rocks at soldiers conducting house-to-house searches in al-Jalazoun refugee camp, outside Ramallah, before dawn. Army gunfire killed a 20-year-old Palestinian and wounded another, hospital officials said.          

The military, which had announced plans to step up its West Bank operations to locate the three Israeli teens who disappeared after leaving a Jewish settlement on Thursday, said it was checking reports on the al-Jalazoun incident.          

Israel accuses Hamas militants of abducting the three youths and has rounded up scores of Palestinians in Hebron, a West Bank city where support for the Islamist faction is strong.            

The military said on Monday troops had detained 40 Palestinians across the West Bank overnight, "including Hamas leadership and operatives", bringing up to 150 the number of arrests since the search operation began.          

Among the detainees were several Palestinian lawmakers from Hamas, including parliament speaker Aziz Dweik, witnesses said.           

Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister Tzachi Hanegbi said the search was being conducted in the wider Hebron area and that forces have not yet zeroed in on a particular neighbourhood.         

"Time is always a negative factor, the more goes by the less positive it is, but our working assumption ... is that the boys are alive and we are exerting every effort to reach them," Hanegbi told Israel Radio.