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Posted on 03/18/2004 7:49:06 AM PST by Alouette
A terrorist plan to hijack two buses in the Efrat area and drive them to the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem was foiled by Israeli security services earlier this month, the Shin Bet released for publication Thursday.
The hijackers, two senior employees of the Palestinian Authority, were to have been kitted out with explosives belts and would threaten to blow themselves up inside the buses. The cell planned to show the bus driver their explosives belts, and direct the driver to take the buses to the nativity church, where they planned to conduct negotiations with Isareli authorities.
The Israeli passengers were to be held hostage until Israeli authorities succumbed to the terrorists' demand to release Palestinian security prisoners. According to the information released for publication, the terrorists also planned to attach a remote-controlled bomb to one passengers.
According to the plan, if Israel failed to release the prisoners, the buses would be blown up as near as possible to the church. This particular Tanzim cell was also responsible for the last two bus bombings in the capital, security services revealed. Nineteen Israelis were murdered in the attacks on the numbers 14 and 19 buses.
In March-April 2002, Palestinian terrorists sought refuge in the famous church and were released as part of an internationally mediated deal.
Security responsibilities for Bethlehem was handed over to the Palestinian Authority in the summer of 2003, and since then the terror infrastructure in the city has blossomed.
The Tanzim cell's explosives 'engineer' was an employee of the PA's Preventive Security service, and he was also worked as the bodyguard of Bethlehem's mayor.
On Purim eve, officials went on to reveal Thursday, Tanzim suicide bombers from Nablus planned a double attack at a Jerusalem nightclub. An explosives belt weighing 6kg was sent by bus from Nablus to Ramallah. The bus was stopped at an IDF checkpoint, but the bus, and its hidden contents, made its way to Ramallah.
Security forces succeeded in thwarting the plans, apprehending the would-be bomber, a 17-year-old from Balata, identified as Jihad abu Mouslem.
According to a report released on Thursday by the security establishment, 15 suicide and shooting attacks have been thwarted since the beginning of this year.
On March 2nd, the Shin Bet, police and IDF thwarted an attempt to carry out a suicide attack in a nightclub in south Tel Aviv.
The bombing was prevented by the arrest of its potential perpetrators, three 16-year-old high school students from Nablus. One was the son of a Palestinian security commander who sits in Bethlehem.
The Nablus Tanzim cell receives funding and instructions from the Hizbullah and is made up – in part - of members of the Palestinian security forces, security services said.
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