JERUSALEM -- Israeli and PLO officials vowed Monday to pursue and punish Islamic militants behind a suicide bombing that killed 19 Israelis on Sunday.


Foreign Minister Shimon Peres said Israel would press PLO leader Yasser Arafat to take vigorous action against Islamic Jihad, the group that claimed two of its members carried out the attack, and Hamas, another militant Moslem group opposed to the PLO-Israel peace deal.


A PLO security official promised that the Palestinian Authority in charge of the Gaza Strip would take stronger measures against the militants than it had in previous instances.


"This time we will not randomly arrest leaders and activists of the groups which carry out attacks against Israelis from Gaza Strip, and release them after a while," said the official, who declined to be named.


"We are going to nip their activities in the bud, we are going to foil their plans in advance," he said.


Arafat on Sunday condemned the attack, which was the deadliest in Israel since a suicide bomber from Hamas killed 22 people on a Tel Aviv bus in October.


But Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister Yossi Beilin said: "He must do something much more serious even if it means a more serious confrontation with his brothers."


The bloody attack shocked Israelis and strained the fragile 1993 peace accord.


Opposition leader Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday called for a halt to negotiations with Arafat and said the government should "untie the hands" of the army.


He said Israeli security forces should be free to strike -- even inside the PLO-run Gaza Strip.


"The crucial questions of security are not the defensive moves you take but offensive moves against the ringleaders of the terror movement, the instigators, the headquarters. They are now immune in Gaza," Netanyahu said in an interview.


"We should act inside Gaza if necessary."


The right's call for tough action against Islamic militants in the autonomous enclaves has gained ground amid rising public anger over a wave of terror attacks. But on this occasion, as before, Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin's cabinet resisted pressure to suspend peace talks.


A no-confidence motion on the government's handling of terrorism was due for a vote Tuesday.


Netanyahu conceded that his party, which controls 32 seats in the 120-member parliament, is unlikely to topple the government, but he said opinion was turning against Rabin's peacemaking.


"The growing sentiment in the Knesset and in the Israeli street is that the people have indeed lost confidence in the direction of this government's policy," said Netanyahu, who has drawn even with Rabin in opinion polls in the past few months.


Rabin's spokesman said the Israeli leader would address the nation later on Monday but the spokesman promised "nothing dramatic."


Israeli newspapers published pictures of the dead under the headlines "Tears of Rage" and "The Children Who Won't Return."


Most of those killed were uniformed conscripts waiting for rides to army bases after weekend leave.


Hundreds of Gazans streamed to the homes of the two men that Islamic Jihad said carried out the attack.


"The Islamic movement gives its condolences to the hero of the attack which led to the killing of 20 pigs and the injuring of 60 monkeys," an unidentified man shouted through a loud speaker at one of the wakes.


Israel said 19 people were killed and more than 60 wounded.


Israeli troops, enforcing a government order, blocked nearly 60,000 Palestinian laborers in Gaza and the occupied West Bank from entering the Jewish state.


Hundreds of anti-government protesters shouting "Death to the Arabs" demonstrated on the streets of Jerusalem and at the scene of the bombing on Sunday night and again on Monday.


The bombing took place at Beit Lid junction near Netanya in central Israel. (Reuters, AP)