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 A bearded rabbi recited Hebrew psalms line by line, the crowd repeating after him, in memory of the dead, one of whom was 26 and the rest between ages 15 and 19. People packed nearby balconies to observe the ceremony, after which the bodies were to be taken for burial.
Thursday's shooting, which also left nine wounded, was the first major attack in Jerusalem in four years and the deadliest incident in Israel since a suicide bomber killed 11 people in Tel Aviv on April 17, 2006. It came on the heels of a surge in fighting between Israelis and Palestinians and further threatened already faltering peace talks.
Israeli defense officials have not identified the gunman -- who was slain during the attack
-- but said he came from east Jerusalem, home to Palestinians who hold Israeli ID cards that give them freedom of movement in Israel, unlike Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza.
The gunman opened fire in the seminary's library, which was crowded for a nighttime study session. Students scrambled to flee the attack, jumping out of windows. Holy books drenched in blood littered the floor.
Afterward, the Jewish seminarians gathered outside the library and screamed for revenge, shouting, "Death to Arabs," while in Hamas-controlled Gaza thousands of Palestinians celebrated in the streets.
Mahmoud Abbas, the moderate Palestinian president with whom Israel is negotiating a peace agreement, condemned the attack. But by Friday morning some Israeli lawmakers called on the government to break off talks.
"The government must immediately halt all negotiations and eradicate terrorism in every way possible," said David Rotem of the hardline Yisrael Beiteinu party. "Later, when we have someone to talk with, we can hold negotiations," he told Israel Radio.
Others rejected that call.
"It's the job of a responsible leadership, a logical leadership, to say in moments like these, looking at the blood, at the cries for revenge ... that we, at least we in Israel, will do everything we can in order not to be dragged into this cycle," dovish lawmaker Yossi Beilin told Israel Radio.
Hamas militants, who have been battling Israel during a weeklong surge in violence in Gaza, praised the attack in a statement but stopped just short of claiming responsibility. "We bless the operation. It will not be the last," Hamas said in a statement.
Police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said the attacker walked through the seminary's main gate and entered the library, where witnesses said some 80 students were gathered. He carried an assault rifle and pistol, and used both weapons in the attack. Rosenfeld said at least six empty bullet clips were found on the floor.
The seminary is the Mercaz Harav yeshiva, a prestigious center of Jewish studies identified with the leadership of the Jewish settlement movement in the West Bank. It serves some 400 high school students and young Israeli soldiers, and many of them carry arms.
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 David Simchon, head of the seminary, said the students were preparing a celebration for the new month on the Jewish calendar, which includes the holiday of Purim. "We were planning to have a Purim party here tonight and instead we had a massacre," he told Channel 2 TV.
The gunman was killed by a seminary graduate who is an army officer and lives nearby, Simchon said Friday. The officer rushed into the seminary with his weapon and killed the gunman, he told Israel Radio: "He saw the terrorist shooting, and with amazing resourcefulness he went into one of the rooms and managed to kill him."
Yehuda Meshi Zahav, head of the Zaka rescue service, entered the library after the attack. "The whole building looked like a slaughterhouse. The floor was covered in blood," he said. "The floors are littered with holy books covered in blood."
Witnesses described a terrifying scene during the shooting, with students jumping out windows to escape.
Israeli government spokesman Mark Regev said the Palestinian government must take steps against the extremists
-- not just denounce their attacks.
"Tonight's massacre in Jerusalem is a defining moment," he said Thursday. "It is clear that those people celebrating this bloodshed have shown themselves to be not only the enemies of Israel but of all of humanity." There had been no decision about the peace talks, he said.
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who only on Wednesday persuaded Abbas to return to peace talks, called the attack an "act of terror and depravity." Abbas had briefly suspended talks to protest an Israeli offensive in Gaza that killed more than 120 Palestinians.
At mosques in Gaza City and the northern Gaza Strip, many residents performed prayers of thanksgiving
-- only performed in cases of great victory to thank God.
About 7,000 Gazans marched in the streets of Jebaliya, firing in the air in celebration, and visited homes of those killed and wounded in the last Israeli incursion. In the southern town of Rafah, residents distributed sweets to moving cars, and militants fired mortars in celebration.
The seminary shooting was the first major attack by Palestinian militants in Jerusalem since a suicide bomber killed eight people on Feb. 22, 2004. Between 2001 and 2004, at the height of Palestinian-Israeli fighting, Jerusalem was a frequent target of Palestinian attacks, including suicide bombings on buses.
[Associated
Press; By MATTI FRIEDMAN]
Copyright 2008 The Associated
Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published,
broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
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