JERUSALEM - U.S. peace envoy Anthony Zinni meets Palestinian President Yasser Arafat on Wednesday, hours after getting a birds-eye view of the latest Middle East bloodshed in which six Israelis and Palestinians were killed.

The retired Marine Corps general flew over Israel and the West Bank in a helicopter with Prime Minister Ariel Sharon on Tuesday, hovering over the northern Israeli city of Afula minutes after two Palestinian gunmen killed two Israelis. Police shot dead the gunmen.

Later in the day, a Palestinian gunman killed an Israeli woman settler in an attack on Israeli vehicles on a main road in the Gaza Strip. Israeli soldiers at a nearby post then shot and killed the assailant, a member of the militant Hamas group.

Words as well as the bullets flew between the two sides, underlining the difficulties Zinni faces in trying to end 14 months of Israeli-Palestinian conflict which has killed more than 900 people.

"We see no change in Arafat's strategy of violence and terror, and if you bring about a tactical change on his part it will be an achievement," Israeli Defence Minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer told Zinni, according to a ministry statement.

Sharon insists there must be a week without violence before he will accept the Palestinians are serious about peacemaking.

The Palestinian Authority said it strongly condemned the two attacks against Israeli civilians and reaffirmed its commitment to Zinni's mission to put a truce-to-talks plan into motion.

"I confirm our full commitment to the peace process as a strategic option for the Palestinian people in order to achieve its consistent national rights," said Arafat, in a statement released by the official Palestinian news agency WAFA.

A faction of Arafat's Fatah and the radical Islamic Jihad group claimed responsibility for the Afula shooting and said the attack was to avenge Israel's killing of militants and the deaths of five boys blown up by an Israeli bomb last week.

U.S. and Israeli sources said Zinni and Sharon took a detour from their aerial tour to fly over Afula after news of the attack. Beneath them ambulances rushed to the scene.

As well as the killings, at least 50 people were wounded in the attack -- one of the bloodiest in Israel in recent weeks.

"I think this (attack) points out the importance of gaining a ceasefire," Zinni later told reporters.

Zinni, accompanied by U.S. Assistant Secretary of State William Burns, planned to meet Arafat in the West Bank city of Ramallah. The United States has said Zinni will remain in the region for as long as it takes to achieve his objectives.

Global pressure for U.S. mediation and a desire to cement Arab support for its anti-terror war in Afghanistan prompted the United States to try again to end Israeli-Palestinian fighting.

At least 725 Palestinians and 192 Israelis have been killed since a Palestinian uprising against Israeli occupation began in September last year.

Israel Radio quoted dovish Foreign Minister Shimon Peres as saying "psychology and diplomacy" were needed "to extinguish the flames of violence".

But Sharon has given no signs of ending an internationally condemned policy of tracking and killing Palestinian militants, and Israeli forces still blockade West Bank cities in what the army describes as a security measure.

He also demands no Palestinian violence for seven days as a condition for moving forward with a peacemaking plan drawn up by a panel led by former U.S. Senator George Mitchell.

Israeli and Palestinian analysts have described Sharon's demand for a week without violence as a tactic aimed at delaying implementation of the blueprint, which calls for a cooling-off period and a freeze in Jewish settlement construction.

With Zinni standing at his side, Sharon pledged to make every effort to reach a ceasefire but said: "All of us understand that we have to take all the necessary steps against terror because terror is the main obstacle for peace."

In a video recorded before the Afula attack, the two gunmen stood in front of their factions' flags cradling assault rifles.

"Our wish is that the Palestinian people continue with the Intifada (uprising) and not give the Jews a minute's peace," one of them said.

In the aftermath of the Afula attack, bodies lay on the ground draped with banners reading: "Only Sharon Will Bring Peace". They were left over from an election in February in which Sharon's promises of security helped sweep him to power. Nampa-Reuters