Moratinos phoned his Israeli counterpart, Tzipi Livni, and President of the Palestinian National Authority, Mahmoud Abbas, calling for calm after an Israeli raid early Tuesday on a prison in the West Bank town of Jericho.

The attack has been launched to arrest Ahmed Saadat, leader of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), who has been imprisoned for almost four years for an alleged role in the murder of far-right Israeli tourism minister Rehavam Zeevi in 2001.

Saadat and several other prisoners surrendered after a 10-hour siege by the Israeli forces, which left several people dead, including Palestinian police officers.

Israeli forces began storming the jail after the withdrawal of three British monitors, part of a team that normally also includes Americans.

The jail attack has sparked a wave of kidnappings by armed groups against European and U.S. citizens in Palestine, and 12 foreigners with different nationalities have been abducted in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank.

A PFLP member died in a shoot-out in Gaza with Palestinian police, which intervened to halt an attempted kidnapping of a foreigner.