JERUSALEM (CNN) -- Palestinians clashed with Israeli police in an East Jerusalem refugee camp Monday, a CNN producer at the scene said.

Over 100 stone-throwing Palestinian youth have been engaged in on-again, off-again skirmishes with over 50 riot-clad Israeli police officials, the producer said.

The clashes followed what Israeli police called a "routine" operation to arrest people in the camp "suspected of disturbances and criminal activity."

Israeli police fired tear gas canisters at the Palestinians, and at least one journalist covering the clashes appeared to have been injured, CNN producer Kareem Khadder said.

Israeli and Palestinian sources offered sharply differing accounts of how the clashes in the Shufat refugee camp began.

Israeli police spokesman Mickey Rosenfeld said the original operation was to arrest people wanted for stone-throwing a few days earlier, and took place in the early hours of the morning.

Rosenfeld said a total of 11 people were arrested in that operation.

Later in the day, he said, Israeli security forces entered Shufat to accompany municipal workers who were "strengthening infrastructure."

He said the presence of security escorts in riot gear was not unusual, and denied it represented a security operation.

He said young Palestinians were let out of school to throw stones at the Israelis, calling clashes like Monday's "regrettable" but "perfectly standard."

Some of the stone throwers were arrested, he said, but could not say how many.

But Palestinians told CNN that Israeli security personnel had arrested scores of people overnight with heavy-handed tactics that were viewed as a provocation.

One Shufat resident, Umm Fadi, told CNN that soldiers had acted abusively toward women and children and that more than 40 people had been arrested in the police operation.