NABLUS, West Bank ? Israel has captured or killed at least 15 Palestinians on its most wanted list, most of them during its three-week military offensive in the West Bank, according to a survey by The Associated Press.

The 15 were high on a list of 48 alleged terrorists from both the West Bank and Gaza that was published recently by Israeli newspapers, and they account for roughly half of the ones from the West Bank; Israel invaded only West Bank areas during its current offensive.

The Yediot Ahronot newspaper, which printed the list in January, said Israel had given it to the CIA in October. Israel demanded that Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat capture the suspects and hand them over to Israeli authorities.

In December, U.S. envoy Anthony Zinni handed Arafat a shorter list of 33 people Israel wanted captured. It was not clear if the newspaper’s list included those 33 suspects, but a Palestinian official said at least some of the names were on both lists.

AP reporters in Nablus, Ramallah, Bethlehem and Hebron questioned relatives of those on the published list, as well as Palestinian security officials, activists of the militant groups and hospitals, and found 15 had either been killed or captured. There were unconfirmed reports that one more was dead. Israel has confirmed some of the arrests or killings.

The men come from the Islamic militant groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad, as well as security services of Yasser Arafat’s Palestinian Authority and militias close to Arafat.

The list may have been updated since it was published, to include those held responsible for more recent attacks. On Thursday, Israel announced the capture of Husam Ataf Ali Badran, who it described as head of the military wing of Hamas in the northern West Bank.

Badran, who was not on the January list, allegedly participated in planning some of the worst suicide bombings in the last years, capped by the bombing on March 27 of a celebration of the Jewish Passover holiday in Netanya in which 28 Israelis and tourists were killed. Two days later, Israel launched the West Bank sweep to destroy what it called the terrorist infrastructure there.

Among those on the list were six killed in what Palestinians called Israeli assassinations before the March 29 offensive in the West Bank.

In its sweep through West Bank towns, Israel has detained more than 4,000 men. The army said 387 of them were previously known terror suspects.

Israel also has reopened a sprawling desert detention camp made infamous during the first Palestinian uprising, from 1987-93, to hold the detainees.

“Altogether, more or less, 1,000 Palestinians are still under arrest because they have been connected to terrorist activities. Among them are many senior terrorists,” said Lt. Col. Olivier Rafowicz, an Israeli military spokesman.

“According to our lists of wanted persons, we are quite satisfied by the results,” Rafowicz said, though he didn’t provide exact figures.

Most of the wanted arrested during the recent military offensive came from the Jenin refugee camp in the northern West Bank, the scene of the heaviest fighting.

Thabet Mardawi, an Islamic Jihad leader, was captured there with two other militants from the group. Mahmoud Tawalbeh, 23, an Islamic Jihad leader and mastermind of several suicide bombings died there, neighbors said.

Abdel Karim Awais, a local leader of the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, a militia close to Arafat, was also arrested in the camp. He escaped an Israeli helicopter attack on his car last June.

On April 5, Israeli forces shelled a Hamas hide-out in the town of Tubas, killing Qeis Odwan, who headed the group’s military wing, Izzedine al Qassam. Five other Hamas members died in the shelling.

A car explosion killed Atef Abayat along with two other people in Bethlehem on Oct. 18. Palestinians say he was assassinated by Israel. The Israelis accused him of involvement in the killing of a Jewish woman settler.

Four other militants on the list were arrested at the Ramallah office of the Palestinian Preventive Security Service, said the service’s West Bank chief, Jibril Rajoub. One of them was Bilal Barghouti of the Islamic militant Hamas group.

Three Palestinians wanted for the assassination of Israeli cabinet minister Rehavam Zeevi in October 2001 are believed hiding in Arafat’s battered headquarters, surrounded by Israeli tanks and soldiers. Israel is insisting they surrender before they lift the siege.

Israel says two of the wanted men are among the 200 armed Palestinians who claimed sanctuary inside the Church of the Nativity, Bethlehem’s ancient basilica where Christians believe Jesus was born. Israeli tanks and troops have surrounded the church compound for 17 days.

During Israel’s recent military raid, other senior Palestinian militia leaders and militants whose names do not appear on the newspaper’s list, have been arrested or killed.

One of the newly arrested was Marwan Barghouti, a top leader in Arafat’s Fatah movement who was taken from his hide-out in Ramallah on Monday.

Israel accuses Barghouti of commanding the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade militia, which is linked to Fatah and has carried out scores of shooting and bombing attacks on Israelis.

Barghouti has never acknowledged he was the militia’s leader, though he has said he considered Israeli soldiers and settlers in the West Bank and Gaza Strip legitimate targets for attack.

The army said Saturday that it had arrested another top militant whose name does not appear on the list, Nasser Awais, the leader of the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade in the northern part of the West Bank.

Others among the 15 who have been killed are Jasser Samaro, Nasim Abu Alrous and Ayman Halawa _ all killed in Nablus in explosions blamed on Israel. Mouhand Diriya, a member of Arafat’s Presidential guard, Force 17, died when his car exploded in Ramallah. Raed Karmi, an Al Aqsa Martrys Brigade leader, was killed in an explosion widely attributed to Israel on Jan. 14.

The other arrested Palestinians are: Ali Sadi and Abdel Halim Izzedine, both Islamic Jihad members arrested in Jenin; Nadal Qalak, a Hamas member arrested in Tulkarem; and Salim Hadja, a Hamas member being held in the compound of Preventive Security in Ramallah.