More police officers will be assigned to areas of the West Bank with a high incidence of illegal activity by Jewish settlers, and the use of restraining order against right-wing extremists who are suspected of violence against Palestinians will be increased, a new ministerial committee decided yesterday.

The panel, created two weeks ago to deal with law enforcement in the West Bank and headed by Defense Minister Amir Peretz, held its first session yesterday. Also participating were ministers Tzipi Livni, Avi Dichter and Roni Bar-On and representatives of the Israel Defense Forces, the police, the Shin Bet security service and the State Prosecutor's Office.

According to the resolution adopted by the forum: "Law enforcement is not subject to interpretation; we are committed to creating immediate tools to carry out the law as written." Among other things, the ministers resolved to guarantee adequate budgets and staffing levels for police in the West Bank and to post officers on long-term assignments, after giving them appropriate training, in areas of significant friction between settlers and Palestinians.

Human rights organizations criticized the decision to increase the use of restraining orders against violent settlers. "Issuing restraining orders against settlers violates their basic rights. [Such orders] are permitted only in rare cases when there are no alternative, less injurious means," said an official at B'Tselem. The group also proposed that soldiers be given explicit instructions to intervene when settlers assault Palestinians.

The Yesh Din organization expressed disappointment with the decisions, claiming that previous attempts to deploy a police force specifically intended to deal with settler violence have failed. It urged Peretz to make it clear that protecting Palestinians and their property from settler violence is one of the main missions of IDF forces in the West Bank, and to issue a clear order to soldiers specifying that they must enforce the law and arrest settlers who behave violently.

The National Union-National Religious Party's Knesset faction also issued a press release denouncing the decision to step up the use of restraining orders, charging that this "completely contradicts a Knesset decision." On December 13, all parties represented in the Knesset, with the exception of the Arab parties, supported a resolution stating: "The Knesset expects the legal authorities to investigate and bring to trial any Israeli citizen who is suspected of a crime ... No use shall be made of restrictive orders, administrative detentions and other means that comprise punishment without trial except in exceptional circumstances where there is a clear danger to national security."

The Yesha Council of Jewish settlements said in a statement that "increasing the political persecution of residents of Judea and Samaria, on a day on which Israeli citizens were killed in a terror attack, smells strongly of primary elections in the Labor Party rather than concern for security."