TEL AVIV Ñ Israel has demanded that Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat arrest 120 Palestinians said to have been involved in attacks on Israeli civilians.

Israeli officials said the government has handed the list to Arafat on the eve of the visit by CIA director George Tenet to the Middle East. Tenet arrives in the region on Wednesday in an effort to promote security cooperation between Israel and the Palestinians. Officials would not provide an itinerary for security reasons.

The demand comes as Israeli authorities are bracing for renewed Palestinian bombings around the Tel Aviv area. Israeli police established roadblocks on major roads to the city in wake of what officials described as a general alert that Islamic groups were planning to place car bombs in the area.

"Arafat is a murderer and a pathological liar," Sharon said. "He is not a head of a state. There were people who believed he would behave like a head of state. But he behaves like a head of terrorists and murderers."

The list relayed to Arafat is comprised mostly of members of Hamas and Islamic Jihad. Officials said those on the list were believed to have been involved in attacks on civilians, including the spate of suicide bombings in Israeli cities. Members of Arafat's ruling Fatah movement are also on the Israeli list.

Arafat declared a ceasefire but has ignored Israeli demands that he arrest militants released from prison over the last eight months. At the same time, Arafat's allies have said they will continue attacks on Israel.

Aides to Arafat acknowledged that the PA chairman was under tremendous pressure to resume attacks against Israel. "Our people are at the edge of a disaster and our president still is in control," the political editor of the official Palestinian Wafa news agency wrote. "But this may not last forever unless the Palestinians start seeing the light of hope brought to them by a peace process accompanied by a freeze in settlements, an end to the siege and starvation in addition to trust building steps which will return the area to its previous stability."

On late Tuesday, a five-month-old Israeli boy was critically injured when he was struck by stones during a trip near the West Bank Jewish settlement of Shilo. The attack set off calls for an end to the Israeli ceasefire as Jewish settlers and their allies are scheduled to hold rallies throughout Israel on Wednesday.

On Wednesday, Jewish settlers clashed with Palestinians when they entered the Palestinian village of Luban Al-Sharkia, the site of the injury to the Israeli baby earlier. Israeli troops entered the village and military sources reported no injuries. In a separate incident, Jewish settlers clashed with Palestinians in the West Bank city of Hebron.

In Washington, U.S. officials appeared more upbeat over the security situation. They said U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell has been urging Sharon to maintain his policy of restraint.

"I would say we have seen a lower level of violence over the past 48 hours, and we are very pleased to see that the situation appears to be headed in the right direction," State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said on Tuesday. "It is important that we see sustained actions by the parties to maintain the situation and to make the cessation of violence endure."

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