THE U.N. Security Council approved a resolution yesterday demanding that Israel stop its siege of Palestinian President Yasser Arafat's West Bank compound while condemning terrorist attacks.

　　The resolution passed 14-0 with America abstaining.

　　The United States has vetoed similar resolutions in the past, but diplomats said Washington decided against doing so in order not to alienate Arab opinion during its campaign for U.N. support against Iraq.

　　Calling the resolution flawed, James Cunningham, the U.S. representative, said, "It failed to explicitly condemn the terrorist groups and those who provide them with political cover, support and safe haven in perpetuating conflict in the Middle East."

　　Arafat spokesman Nabil Abu Rdeineh called the vote "a step in the right direction."

　　The approved resolution "demands that Israel immediately cease measures in and around Ramallah, including the destruction of Palestinian civilian and security infrastructure."

　　It further demands "the withdrawal of the Israeli occupying forces from Palestinian cities toward the return to positions held prior to September 2000."

　　The resolution also "calls on the Palestinian Authority to meet its expressed commitment to ensure that those responsible for terrorist acts are brought to justice," and it reiterates a demand for the cessation of all acts of violence.

　　Also yesterday, the European Union told Arafat that it is urging Israel to ease the siege.

　　In a telephone call to Arafat, Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen, whose country holds the rotating EU presidency, said the EU was urging Israel to withdraw its troops to bring about a "de-escalation of the situation.''

　　Meanwhile, Israeli troops backed by dozens of tanks raided Gaza City in the deepest incursion yet into the Palestinians' largest metropolis, killing nine Palestinians in gun battles in crowded neighborhoods.

　　Soldiers destroyed 13 workshops where the army said crude rockets were being made, and blew up the family house of a Hamas militiaman who killed five Israeli teen-agers in a shooting rampage in a Jewish settlement in Gaza earlier this year.