- JERUSALEM (Reuters) - A Palestinian
blew himself up near a police patrol in northern Israel Monday in the second
suicide bombing in less than 24 hours, police said.
-
- The incident occurred at about 7:20 a.m. near a bus stop
at Taanachim Junction in the southern Galilee when a tall man wearing jeans
and sports shoes tried to get on a bus picking up workers who were going
to a nearby factory.
-
- When told it was a private bus, he disembarked but suspicious
passengers alerted the police by mobile phone, police sources said.
-
- The blast occurred when two members of a police patrol
approached the man and asked for his identity papers. "We spoke to
him and asked him who he was. He began to move back and then exploded,"
patrolman Nayef Ghanem told Army radio.
-
- Police believed the bomber was on his way to the nearby
town of Afula, which has been a target of previous attacks.
-
- The area is just on the Israeli side of the demarcation
line between Israel and the West Bank and about 9 miles from Jenin, a focal
point of the military campaign Israel unleashed in the West Bank at the
end of March.
-
- Monday's abortive attack followed a suicide bombing in
a vegetable market in the seaside town of Netanya Sunday in which the bomber
killed three Israelis as well as himself.
-
- Security sources have warned Israelis that the recent
respite from almost daily bombing attacks may be at an end.
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