RAMALLAH, West Bank ? Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said Monday that Israeli troops would press ahead with a campaign against Palestinian militants in two major West Bank towns despite U.S. pleas for a full withdrawal. Israel also grabbed a senior aide to Yasser Arafat, Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade leader Marwan Barghouti, whom Sharon says was behind suicide bombings.

But Sharon told President Bush in a telephone conversation Monday that Israeli troops would, within a week, pull out of Jenin and Nablus, White House spokesman Ari Fleischer said. However, Sharon said in a CNN interview that Israeli forces would remain indefinitely in Ramallah, where they surround Arafat’s headquarters, and in Bethlehem until terrorists surrender for trial or exile.

Marwan Barghouti, a leader in Yasser Arafat's Fatah movement, is shown with the Palestinian leader in this Dec. 31, 2001, file photo. Israel captured Barghouti, who was on Israel's wanted list for allegedly masterminding terror attacks, on Monday.

“Altogether, we are on our way out,” Sharon said in the first indication of a time frame for ending the large-scale campaign against Palestinian militants that began March 29.

The Israeli withdrawal was far from the complete rollback that the American government is seeking. The two exceptions to the pullback Sharon gave were Bethlehem, where Israeli forces are engaged in a standoff with more than 200 armed men in the Church of the Nativity, and Ramallah, where Israeli troops surround Palestinian leader Arafat’s office.

Sharon said Israeli forces will not leave Bethlehem until the standoff is over and will not leave Ramallah until those behind the October assassination of Tourism Minister Rehavam Zeevi are handed over.

Palestine: No bargains

In response, Palestinian Information Minister Yasser Abed Rabbo said, “We don’t plan to deal with these conditions. He must leave every city that has been reoccupied without any conditions. We are not going to bargain with the Israelis over every town and village.”

Sharon and Bush spoke for 15 minutes, Sharon’s office said early today.

According to Fleischer, Bush told Sharon that an Israeli pullout from Jenin and Nablus “will increase the prospects to bring peace to the region.”

Bush also appealed to Sharon for the humane treatment of Palestinian civilians in the areas overrun by Israeli troops in recent weeks.

In Ramallah, elite Israeli troops seized Marwan Barghouti, a popular figure in the West Bank who Israel says is the leader of the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, which was behind the latest suicide bombing, an attack Friday in a Jerusalem market that killed six people plus the woman bomber.

In the Jenin refugee camp in the northern West Bank, medics began retrieving bodies, but it might be days until it becomes clear how many Palestinians died in the fiercest battle of Israel’s offensive, a point of contention between the two sides.

In Bethlehem, Israeli troops exchanged fire with Palestinians inside the church compound, built over the grotto where tradition says Jesus was born.

Two Palestinian policemen one seriously wounded several days ago and the other reportedly suffering a nervous breakdown also surrendered to Israeli troops ringing the shrine, witnesses said. They became the first Palestinians to surrender in the 12-day standoff.

In his CNN interview, Sharon said Israel and the United States agree that the armed men inside the church must surrender and those deemed to be connected with terrorism should be tried in Israel or deported, perhaps with British assistance, to an unspecified country. The Palestinians have rejected the idea.

Pope John Paul II called The Rev. Ibrahim Faltas, who is in charge of the church, on Monday. Faltas told The Associated Press the call was “a message from the pope to support and encourage us,” and the pope “thanked us for our deep steadfastness and courage.”

Commander captured

On Monday, an elite Israeli force searching for militants captured Barghouti, 41, at the Ramallah house of Fatah official Ziad Abu Ain, who also was detained, West Bank security chief Jibril Rajoub said.

Israel accuses Barghouti, sometimes mentioned as a possible successor to Arafat, of direct involvement in nine different attacks suicide bombings and shootings in which 13 Israelis and a Greek Orthodox monk were killed.

The Israeli army said a force of infantry, armored corps and elite soldiers surrounded a house in northern Ramallah and ordered those inside to come out.

According to Israel Radio, Barghouti initially told the soldiers in Hebrew, “I know you’ve come for me,” but he refused to come out. The elite unit went in and Barghouti surrendered without a fight. No shots were fired, the radio said.

Barghouti and his nephew, Ahmed, were given to security forces for interrogation, the army said in a statement.

Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres said Barghouti will be put on trial in Israel.

“It will be basically open,” he told CNN’s Larry King.

In a statement, the military said Barghouti, “as part of his work … received large budgets from local and foreign groups, including (funds) authorized by the signature of Yasser Arafat.”

Barghouti is head of the Tanzim, part of Arafat’s Fatah organization, and “was considered the commander and guide of the Al Aqsa Brigades, which are blamed for a large number of deadly terrorist attacks in which dozens of Israelis were killed and hundreds injured,” the military said.

Defense Minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer said Barghouti turned Tanzim into “the most murderous of the terrorist organizations committing most of the recent attacks against Israel, attacks of all types, but principally suicide attacks including female bombers, shootings and bombings.”

Sharon cited Barghouti’s arrest in explaining the importance of the military campaign.

“Just imagine if we had withdrawn one day earlier and he would have been free and he’d be able to continue,” he said.

Rajoub warned against harming Barghouti.

“Killing or humiliating him will bring catastrophes for Israel and will expand the circle of violence,” he said.

Also, Israeli forces in Ramallah arrested two leaders of the militant Hamas, Jamal Tawil and Fayez Abu Wardeh, Palestinians said. The Israeli military had no immediate comment.