Posted on 03/05/2002 11:06:54 AM PST by michaelje
By Jeffrey Heller
JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Palestinian rockets, gunmen and a suicide bomber drew Israeli blood Tuesday in a dizzying array of attacks that triggered a day of revenge strikes with no end in sight to violence spiraling rapidly out of control.
Secretary of State Colin Powell spoke by telephone with Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, who told him Israel would "continue to take all necessary measures to protect the lives of its citizens," Sharon's office said in a statement.
Israeli retaliation included a helicopter missile attack on a car near the West Bank city of Ramallah that targeted Palestinian militants.
The strike, which Palestinians called an assassination, killed Mohannad Abu Halaweh, an aide to West Bank Fatah leader Marwan Barghouthi, and Fawzi Murran of the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades. Two other Palestinians were wounded.
Palestinians in Gaza fired three home-made Qassam rockets at the southern Israeli town of Sderot. One hit an apartment building, wounding three people, police said.
It was the first time such weapons have hit a town in Israel. In response, Israeli helicopters and an F-16 warplane fired missiles at two Palestinian security compounds in Gaza, wounding a policeman and a civilian, security officials said.
The day's bloodshed began when a Palestinian armed with an assault rifle, grenades and a knife killed three Israelis and wounded 25 at a Tel Aviv restaurant before dawn.
Israel retaliated by launching air raids against Palestinian security installations in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. A sharply rising death toll prompted talk of open warfare and increased the urgency of international peace efforts.
GROWING SENSE OF INSECURITY
The assault in the heart of Tel Aviv, Israel's business and entertainment capital, stirred a growing sense of insecurity in a small country where almost nowhere seemed to be safe.
Customers relaxing in the restaurant and club dived for cover under tables during the rampage before the gunman was shot dead by a man in the restaurant and police.
"We were in the middle of the club and suddenly shots rang out... I saw a terrorist firing and then my friend shot him," one witness said.
The al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, affiliated to Palestinian President Yasser Arafat's Fatah faction, said it carried out the attack to avenge the killing of a mother and three children with a tank shell Monday and a raid into a West Bank refugee camp.
Six hours later, a Palestinian suicide bomber killed himself and an Israeli on a bus in the northern town of Afula in an attack claimed by the militant Islamic Jihad group.
A gunman shot dead an Israeli settler in her car, and a bomb -- possibly planted by a Jewish vigilante group -- lightly hurt a schoolteacher and seven children at a school for Palestinian boys in a village at Jerusalem's edge.
Israeli forces killed a Palestinian in a gun battle in the West Bank, south of Jerusalem, and fired four missiles at an empty Palestinian security headquarters in Khan Younis in the Gaza Strip.
Israeli aircraft later fired missiles at Jneid Prison and a police station in Nablus and struck security compounds in Ramallah, Tulkarm and Bethlehem, all cities in the West Bank. Two people were wounded.
ISRAELI SECURITY CABINET MEETS
Israel's security cabinet met to consider the new bloodshed after Sharon ruled out talks with the Palestinians until they were beaten. He vowed to hit them so hard they would understand "terrorism will achieve nothing."
Sharon's office, in a one-sentence statement summing up the meeting, said: "The security cabinet decided to continue intensified security activities, including in Ramallah."
Israeli political sources said the ministers had decided to step up military operations in the West Bank and Gaza and tighten travel restrictions on the Palestinians.
The sources said the forum left open the option of tightening a closure around Arafat.
Israel imposed a military blockade on his headquarters in December, demanding he curb militants who have killed scores of Israelis in gun and bomb attacks, but moved tanks away from the compound last week while continuing to confine him to Ramallah.
Palestinians remained defiant. Thousands marched at the funeral of the woman and her three children killed by a single tank shell in Ramallah, chanting: "Sharon, Sharon. We will give you our answer." Israel apologized for their deaths.
The violence has shocked Israelis and Palestinians and raised the toll to at least 944 Palestinians and 311 Israelis killed since a Palestinian uprising against Israeli occupation began in September 2000 after peace talks stalled.
"The cycle of violence will continue and will lead to more deterioration in the region unless an international intervention is there and unless international monitors are dispatched," said Nabil Abu Rdainah, an aide to Arafat.
Sharon's opinion poll ratings have sunk as the Israeli death toll rises. He is trying to find a way to satisfy rightists demanding tougher action against the Palestinians and appease leftists seeking talks on ending the conflict.
"We were in the middle of the club and suddenly shots rang out... I saw a terrorist firing and then my friend shot him," one witness said. "
Yet again, an armed citizen comes to the rescue. Lets see how many media outlets pick up this aspect of the story.
Splendid. They should target Barghouthi as well, and make every effort to make these coming hours his last on earth.
Having been there four times since the 1973 war, I can tell you that you'd not only be overdressed, you'd be underequipped. The Uzi is passe, replaced by the CAR15 for most soldiers and police, with the more robust and reliable shorty Glilon version of the Galil rifle being the Uzi's replacement for tank and other armoured vehicle crews.
Grenades are the more usual equipment of the terrorists, and are likely to get you shot dead should you sport one in public, and though the .45 is not unknown, particularly in the conveniently-sized Star PD version, the Jerico 941, Browning GP and Beretta model 51 [NOT the current US military-issue Beretta M92] are far more common. Even the old German Walther P.38 and P.08 Luger show up here and there, as does the odd Glock or Star 9mm pistol. The current campaign is better fought with light rifles, carried everywhere and always if at all, and radios, or their civilian cellphone equivalents, than with the gear you suggest, though the Israelis are used to seeing chokolatniki Amerakavim with odd ways doing the strangest damnfool things.
-archy-/-
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