Israelis arm themselves amid heavy security after Palestinian attacks

PM Netanyahu reiterated his willingness to meet Palestinian leader Mahmud Abbas, while accusing him of inciting violence

Israeli security forces deployed massively in Jerusalem as Jews armed themselves with everything from guns to broomsticks, rattled by a wave of Palestinian attacks that have shaken the country.

Meanwhile, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reiterated his willingness to meet Palestinian leader Mahmud Abbas, while accusing him of inciting and encouraging violence.

"It's time that president Abbas stops not only justifying it, but also calling for it," Netanyahu told reporters.

US Secretary of State John Kerry also warned the Palestinian leader not to incite violence.

"No amount of frustration is appropriate to licence any violence anywhere at any time. No violence should occur. And the Palestinians need to understand," he told NPR News in a radio interview to air Friday.

"President Abbas has been committed to non-violence. He needs to be condemning this, loudly and clearly," said Kerry, who plans to travel to the region "in the coming days" to try to calm tempers.

Abbas has called for peaceful protest, but frustrated Palestinian youths have defied attempts to restore calm.

The UN Security Council will hold an emergency meeting Friday to discuss the two-week upsurge in violence which has raised fears that a third Palestinian intifada, or uprising, might erupt.

Israel has mobilised some 300 soldiers to reinforce police stretched thin by the unrest.

They are due to be in place by Sunday, while conscripts wearing fluorescent vests marked "police" could already be seen guarding Tel Aviv's bus station.

The last time soldiers deployed in such large numbers was in 2002, during the second intifada, according to a security source.

At stops along the highway between Jerusalem and the West Bank city of Hebron, a major junction to other points in the occupied territory, border police were boarding and searching every bus.

In addition to the attacks, violent protests have rocked annexed east Jerusalem, the occupied West Bank and the Gaza Strip.

Yesterday marked a rare respite from the violence.

However, Palestinians were calling for a day of protests in the West Bank and Gaza Strip after Friday's main weekly Muslim prayers.

Seven Israelis have been killed and dozens wounded in the violence so far.

At least 30 Palestinians have also died, including alleged attackers, and hundreds more been wounded in clashes with Israeli forces.