16 dead in twin suicide attacks on Be'er Sheva buses

Ha'aretz
September 1, 2004
00:44 am
http://www.haaretzdaily.com/hasen/spages/471713.html

Sixteen people, including a 3-year-old boy, were killed and about 
100 others were wounded Tuesday afternoon in near-simultaneous 
suicide attacks on two buses in the southern city of Be'er Sheva. 

Hamas claimed the attacks, the first suicide bombings inside Israel 
in five months. 

Seventeen people were still hospitalized by Tuesday night, eight of 
them in serious-to-critical condition. All of the wounded were taken 
to Soroka Medical Center in Be'er Sheva. 

In response to the attack, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and Defense 
Minister Shaul Mofaz decided in a Tuesday night meeting with top 
security officials, security officials will launch a military 
offensive in the West Bank city of Hebron, the home of Be'er Sheva 
suicide bombers Ahmed Kawasma and Nassim Jabri. 

Hebron will be surrounded and Palestinians' freedom of movement 
there will likely be severely limited. Shortly after the attack, 
Israel Defense Forces troops in the West Bank raided the bombers' 
homes.

Security forces will also bolster security along the seam line 
between the southern Hebron Hills and the Negev, the area which 
the suicide bombers apparently passed on their way to carrying 
out the attack. 

In addition, security forces have imposed a full closure on the 
Gaza Strip in the wake of Monday's attempted suicide bombing at 
the Erez Crossing. Palestinian workers have also been banned 
from working in Israel or in the Erez industrial zone until 
further notice. Assassinations of senior Hamas leaders in the 
Gaza Strip are also expected to increase.

The initial investigation of the Be'er Sheva attack showed that 
both buses departed from the central bus station in the city, 
and two suicide bombers - one on each bus - blew themselves up 
at 2:50 P.M., about 100 meters apart. 

"I heard a blast and I started to run to the site. Within seconds 
there was another explosion," said Gil Yehezekel, the owner of 
a business close to the location of the attack.

"When I got there, there were people on the floor, wounded people, 
limbs torn off," he said. "The police and ambulances arrived in 
seconds." 

The driver of the second bus that blew up, Yaakov Cohen, said that 
when he saw the bus ahead of his explode in a ball of flame he had 
a premonition his own vehicle would soon be next.

"I saw the first explosion and thought, my God, I've got to get 
out of here. I drove [my bus] about 10 meters and then opened the 
doors," he said from his hospital bed, where he was being treated 
for leg wounds.

"I believe that between 10 to 15 people got off my bus. Suddenly 
I heard a huge explosion. I can't explain it but it was almost as 
if I knew it was going to happen. It was terrible, terrible ... 
I don't want to describe what I saw."

Cohen said there had been 20 to 30 people still waiting to leave 
his vehicle when the bomb went off, and that none of the passengers 
who boarded his bus earlier had looked suspicious. 

"Believe me, I look and check," Cohen said. "It is very hard to 
identify a bomber ... I don't know how anyone can."

Sharon vowed in the wake of the attacks that "the fight against 
terror will continue with full strength." Sharon will continue 
with the disengagement plan, his aides said.

The Palestinian Authority condemned "any attacks that target 
civilians, whether Israelis or Palestinian," Palestinian Minister 
Saeb Erekat said. The United States and European Union also 
condemned the attack.

In the Gaza Strip, Muslim leaders praised the "heroic operation" 
over mosque loudspeakers. 

About 20,000 Hamas supporters sang and threw candy in the streets 
of Gaza City in celebration of the bombings and their casualties. 

Hamas claimed responsibility through a leaflet that surfaced in 
Hebron, 50 km from Be'er Sheva, saying the attacks were meant to 
avenge Israel's assassination of its two top leaders in helicopter 
missile strikes in March and April. 

"This is but one of a series of responses in which the Iz a Din 
al-Kassam Brigades have vowed to carry out in response to the 
martyrdom of the leaders of our movement, Sheikh Ahmed Yassin and 
Abdel Aziz Rantisi," it said.

"Revenge is so sweet," said one celebrator, hoisting high a poster 
of Abdel-Aziz al-Rantissi.

The IDF believes that the military wing of Hamas in Hebron is 
behind the attack. 

Hamas supporters said they were pleased the group's repeated 
attempts to launch attacks against the Jewish state had finally 
caused Israeli casualties.

"Our religion orders us to respond in kind to aggression against 
us. You [Israeli people] are the ones who choose your leaders 
and choose to be their shields. Therefore your shields will 
suffer more blows," the leaflet said.

"This is a gift to the newcomers who arrived recently to our land," 
it added in a reference to recent wave of Jewish immigration to 
Israel. "We say to you: 'This is your fate, so wait.'"

Following the blasts, the police bolstered the number of officers 
across the country. There had apparently been no alert that an 
attack was imminent.

Palestinian militants haven't carried out a suicide bombing inside 
Israel since March 14, when 11 people were killed in the port city 
of Ashdod.

Earlier Tuesday, Israel Defense Forces soldiers caught a 
Palestinian man carrying an explosives belt as he tried to cross 
into Israel from the Gaza Strip. 

Emergency numbers:
Soroka Medical Center: 12-55-177
Immigrant hotline:12-55-80-1010 
Be'er Sheva municipality: 08-646-3777