Posted on 11/21/2002 2:20:06 AM PST by kattracks
JERUSALEM, Nov 21 (Reuters) - What began as an everyday trip to school for many children on Jerusalem's number 20 bus ended in carnage on Thursday after a Palestinian suicide bomber posing as a commuter boarded and blew it up.
One of the 10 dead, a 14-year-old girl, died on arrival at Jerusalem's Hadassah hospital.
"She was fatally wounded. There was really nothing we could do for her," Dr Shmuel Shapira, deputy head of the hospital, told Israel Radio.
One witness said he had heard survivors screaming "Mamma, Mamma" from the twisted wreckage of the bus, whose windows were shattered and interior ripped apart.
The blast was so powerful that it splattered human flesh and blood on a white wall some 30 metres (100 feet) away.
"The explosion was so loud I thought the roof (of my house) had come off," said Ariel Gino, who lived near the scene in the Kiryat Menahem neighbourhood in southern Jerusalem.
"I rushed out and saw people lying on the street. Some were screaming, some were crying. There were about five or six people still in the bus. They weren't moving. Some on the street had blood on their faces, others had burns," Gino told Reuters.
Rescue workers quickly covered a charred torso hanging out of the bus window.
SCHOOL BOOKS AMONG WRECKAGE
Books spilled out of a black school bag collected by rescue workers from debris scattered around the shell of the bus and a piece of burnt note paper fluttered to the ground.
Israel Radio said residents of the neighbourhood ran out of their houses screaming "Where are my kids? Where are my kids?" when they heard the explosion, which occurred shortly after 7 a.m. (0500 GMT), during the morning rush hour. Medical officials reported at least half of the more than 47 people rushed to hospital by ambulance crews were under 18, many on their way to school.
At least seven were critically wounded.
One man who was driving past the bus as it exploded told Israel Radio: "I saw people draped out of the windows...one of them with their head to one side, not moving...Two or three children were screaming inside the bus, and then they climbed out of the window."
Police said the bomber had been sitting at the front of the bus when he detonated his explosives. His body was so mangled it was impossible to tell whether the bomb had been strapped to his body or hidden in a bag he carried.
They said he was a 23-year-old from the Palestinian-ruled city of Bethlehem in the West Bank, near Kiryat Menahem.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility from Palestinian militant groups, which have blown up several dozen Israeli buses since a Palestinian uprising began in September 2000 after peace negotiations became deadlocked.
At least 1,674 Palestinians and 640 Israelis have been killed since then, excluding the deaths in Thursday's bombing. ((Jerusalem newsroom, +972-2-537-0502, jerusalem.newsroom@reuters.com))
Because the US makes them. The official policy of President Bush is "two nations". The US won't let Israel do what it needs to do.
Murder is murder and the use of any method up to the use of lethal force is necessary to stop this type of thing.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.