Israel to destroy homes of terrorist suspects
Israel intends to destroy the family homes of four Palestinians suspected of terrorist attacks that killed 36 bystanders - a punitive measure the Israelis believe also acts as a deterrent.
Israeli police posted notices on the four houses in Jerusalem, giving the families 48 hours to appeal to an Israeli court to stop their destruction, said Jerusalem police spokesman Shmuel Ben-Ruby. He said the Israeli military approved the orders.
In the Gaza Strip early today, Israeli helicopters fired five missiles at a metal workshop in the city of Khan Younis setting the building on fire in apparent retaliation for two Palestinian attacks in Gaza on yesterday that killed two Israeli soldiers.
Hospital officials said there were no casualties. The Israeli military said the target was a weapons factory.
Police and soldiers were stepping up security today before the beginning of the Jewish New Year holiday at sunset. Early today, police stopped cars entering a Jerusalem suburb and checked each driver, explaining that they had a warning that Palestinians would try to stage an attack there.
The arrest of the four Jerusalem Arabs last month shocked Israelis. It was the first time Palestinians who lived in Jerusalem were accused of involvement in deadly terrorism.
The four are suspected of planning and carrying out three bloody bomb attacks. One allegedly planted a bomb in a Jerusalem university cafeteria on July 31, killing 10 people.
The other attacks attributed to the four alleged members of a Hamas cell, are a suicide bombing at a Jerusalem cafe on March 9 that killed 11 Israelis and a May 7 suicide attack at a pool hall in a Tel Aviv suburb that killed 15 Israelis.
Israeli officials have been seeking deterrent measures to stop or at least reduce deadly Palestinian attacks that have plagued Israel during more than 23 months of fighting.
The military began destroying family homes of suicide bombers several weeks ago and has also started expelling relatives of attackers from the West Bank to Gaza, claiming that if potential bombers know relatives will be punished, they may have second thoughts.
On Wednesday, after Israel’s Supreme Court gave its approval, the military expelled two siblings of a Palestinian explosives expert to Gaza.
There has been a month-long lull in major Palestinian attacks, but that appeared to come to an end on yesterday.
In Gaza, Palestinians blew up an Israeli tank and attacked an army patrol, killing two soldiers, and a few hours earlier, Israeli police and volunteers foiled an attempt to place a huge car bomb in Israel.
Police said the bomb was made up of 1,300lbs of explosives, enough to knock down an apartment building and cause hundreds of casualties.
Israeli foreign minister Shimon Peres said such an attack could change the Middle East situation in an instant. Police warned that it was apparently an attempt to carry out a major attack on the eve of the New Year holiday.
Israeli defence minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer told a meeting of his Labour Party activists that because of the Palestinian attacks in Gaza, Israel would not implement an agreement to hand control of parts of Gaza back to the Palestinians.
Also yesterday, Palestinian militants killed two Palestinians they suspected of collaborating with Israeli intelligence. The Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, linked to Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat’s Fatah movement, took responsibility.
