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Last update - 04:09 08/10/2004
At least 35 dead in three Sinai explosions
By Amos Harel, Yoav Stern and Revital Levy-Stein, Haaretz Correspondents, and Haartetz Service

TABA HILTON, Egypt - At least 35 people were killed and over 100 injured in three separate attacks on holiday resorts in the Sinai Desert that were packed with Israelis.

The most devastating attack occured at around 10 P.M. Thursday when a blast ripped through the Hilton Hotel in the resort town of Taba, close to the border with Israel.

Egyptian police said at least 35 people were killed in the attacks, and Israeli police said that most of the dead were Israeli tourists. The Egyptian tourism minister said 120 people had been wounded.

Israeli security sources said there was growing conviction that the explosion had been caused by an explosives-laden truck.

Two other blasts occurred about two hours later in the area of the nearby resort towns of Ras Satan, a camping area full of Israeli tourists, and Nueiba, witnesses said.

Two Israelis were killed in the blast at Ras Satan, Channel 10 television said. Egyptian television said 43 people had been wounded in the explosion at the resorts, almost all of them tourists.

The explosion at the Hilton in Taba caused the ceiling of the lobby to collapse. The hotel was at full occupancy at the time of the explosion.

A fire then broke out at the hotel, and hotel guests on the upper floors were evacuated via the emergency exits. Later, 10 floors of the western wing of the hotel caved in as well.

Israeli rescue services were in Taba evacuating the wounded and trying to extract people trapped below the rubble of the devastated hotel. Four hours after the blast, Israel Defense Forces spokeswoman, Brig. Gen. Ruth Yaron, said that Israeli forces were in command of the evacuation of the wounded and dead at the scene.

The bodies of two Israelis, a young man and a young woman, were reported at the Small Ras Satan site, also known as Moon Island. Following two explosions at that site, electrical power went out and the area was plunged into darkness. Some 300 Israelis, some of them with head wounds and other injuries, were separated from other tourists by the Egyptian Army for their protection. The Israeli tourists at Moon Island did not know if Israeli authorities were aware of their situation.

Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom had asked his Egyptian counterpart for permission to fly Israeli rescue workers into Sinai.

Egypt initially closed the border with Israel, preventing Israeli rescue personnel from crossing, but re-opened it a short time later, allowing Israeli rescue workers, including firefighters from nearby Eilat to cross.

Shalom also asked the Egyptian foreign minister for permission to allow Israelis to pass through the border crossing without passport checks and to send between 20 and 30 buses to the Sinai to bring home the Israelis in the area, Foreign Ministry spokesman Gideon Meir said.

There are approximately 15,000 Israelis still in the Sinai, said the director of the Flying Carpet, one of the larger tourism companies in Sinai.

"There is a plan to send buses to help them evacuate, those who want to," said Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Rachel Shani.

Israelis headed to Sinai over the Sukkot holiday, which ended Thursday night, despite a travel warning issued last month by the defense establishment cautioning Israelis against traveling to the area, following warnings of a possible terrorist attack.

In the wake of the explosions, the anti-terror unit in the Prime Minister's Office called on all Israelis to leave Sinai immediately and return to Israel, Army Radio reported.

In the wake of the explosion, Israel amassed a large number of rescue personnel on the Egyptian border, and Israel Air Force planes were scrambled.

An Israeli witness at the Hilton said that the hotel was on fire, and that dozens of bodies were lying on the floor. "There were dozens of bodies strewn everywhere, some of them children," said Rani, a paramedic with the private Ambulance A company in Eilat, standing at the entrance to the Hilton Hotel. "I personally saw about 30."

"I heard a huge explosion," said a man identified as Yigal. "The wall near me collapsed and people began to run. There were a lot of people lying on the ground, a lot of blood and a lot of screaming... The explosion was outside. When we went out, we saw the shops and the
interior wall of the hotel had collapsed. The entire front of the hotel collapsed... The whole thing was on fire."

The blast could be heard about two kilometers from the hotel, said Selma Abu el-Dahab, who works at another Taba hotel.

Emergency numbers:
Yoseftal Hospital: 12 55 175
Soroka Medical Center: 12 55 177