Israel's security cabinet was meeting Saturday to weigh its response to a suicide bombing outside a Tel Aviv nightclub overnight that left 18 dead and some 120 others injured, amid growing pressure to strike back at the Palestinians, said reports.
The bomber, who was among the dead, blew himself up among a group of young people waiting in line to enter the Pasha discotheque, a popular night spot in this coastal city.
It was the deadliest incident so far in the eight-month-old Palestinian Intifada, or uprising, against Israeli occupation, and brought the death toll to nearly 600, the vast majority of them Palestinians.
Groups of demonstrators shouted "death to Arabs" outside the defense ministry in Tel Aviv where Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon was meeting with senior ministers and military chiefs, said Haaretz newspaper.
"Answer war with war," they shouted.
They pressed the cabinet, which is authorized to take decisions on security matters, to end the unilateral ceasefire Sharon declared 10 days ago, the paper added.
Speaking before the meeting began, Sharon’s spokesman Raanan Gissin said "the cabinet will certainly reexamine the question of the unilateral ceasefire."
Sharon has come under fire from Jewish settlers living in the occupied Palestinian territories, with four of their number killed in the space of three days this week.
The three-man mini-security cabinet consisting of Sharon, Foreign Minister Shimon Peres and Defense Minister Benjamin Ben-Eliezer met earlier Saturday morning to discuss a response to the bombing.
It was proposed to tighten the closure on the Palestinian territories, including the Gaza port, Israel Radio said.
Other proposals were the closing of Gaza airport to incoming and outgoing flights, including Palestinian President Yasser Arafat's private plane.
Israel Radio quoted senior sources in Jerusalem as saying that the attack signaled the end of the unilateral ceasefire declared by Sharon 10 days ago, and that the prime minister would likely postpone his planned trip to Europe, scheduled to begin on Monday.
In the wake of the bombing, security officials called on all Palestinian workers inside Israel, whether in possession of a work permit or not, to immediately return to their homes in the territories.
A statement issued by the office of Ben-Eliezer said that, "This is one of the worst terror attacks we have known. Israel is doing everything possible to end the violence. Yasser Arafat is trying to plunge the region into chaos."
Talking from the scene of the attack, Public Security Minister Uzi Landau said that Israel had still not used "all the means at its disposal, but we have to understand who our enemy is - an enemy void of mercy or any moral barriers."
Transport Minister Ephraim Sneh termed the bombing a "strategic attack, in a place where there are children, teenagers. Nothing can be worse than this. We will have to change the rules of the game," Haaretz quoted him as saying.
Since the outbreak of the latest Israeli-Palestinian conflict last September, Reuters reports that Palestinians have killed approximately 88 Israelis with weapons ranging from stones and knives to machineguns and car bombs. The latest bombing raises that toll by 18.
In the same time period, according to Reuters, Israeli soldiers and armed Jewish settlers have killed 13 Arab Israelis and 448 Palestinians with weapons ranging from machineguns and tanks to US-made Apache helicopter gunships and F-16s. According to Amnesty International, nearly 100 of those killed were children.
Jewish author Noam Chomsky, who according to a New York Times Book Review article is “arguably the most important intellectual alive,” has been quoted as saying: “State terrorism is an extreme form of terrorism, generally much worse than individual terrorism because it has the resources of a state behind it.”
PALESTINIAN HIZBOLLAH CLAIMS RESPONSIBILTY FOR ATTACK
The Palestinian Hizbollah group on Saturday claimed responsibility for the attack, reported AL Jazeera satellite channel.
It said in a statement that the suicide bombing was “on the occasion of ending out military exercise.”
The two main Islamic movements, Hamas and Islamic Jihad, refrained from claiming responsibility.
Interviewed by Al Jazeera satellite channel, Hamas spokesman Abdelaziz Rantissi said his movement had not claimed to be behind the bombing.
But he said the Palestinians had the right to "resist Israeli occupation."
Islamic Jihad spokesman Abdullah Al Shami also denied his group had claimed responsibility, as had been reported by some media outlets.
He said the Palestinians did not fear Israeli reprisals.
"Every people who fights for its liberation must pay a price for it," he told the TV.
The two Islamist movements both oppose any compromise with Israel and have claimed responsibility for the majority of anti-Israeli attacks since the start of a Palestinian uprising in late September.
ISRAELIS SAY ARAFAT RESPONSIBLE FOR ATTACK
Israeli leaders roundly condemned Arafat for the bombing, saying he had not taken action against perpetrators of violence, reports said.
Israeli President Moshe Katsav said from the United States, where he is on a state visit, that Arafat "believes that by provoking an escalation, the situation is going to improve for him."
US President George W. Bush also called on Arafat to take action after the "heinous terrorist attack."
"There is no justification for senseless attacks against innocent civilians. I call upon Chairman Arafat to condemn this act and to call for an immediate ceasefire," Bush said in a statement issued from the presidential resort in Camp David, Maryland.
Israeli Minister of Internal Security Uzi Landau said Arafat "is the one who has made it possible for these organizations, over which he has jurisdiction," while Ben Eliezer accused the Arafat of wanting "to provoke chaos in the Middle East," said Haretz.
"The attack perpetrated Friday night in Tel Aviv is one of the most atrocious we have known. It came as Israel is doing all it can so that a ceasefire can be installed that ends the violence," he said in a statement.
On Saturday, Israeli Communications Minister Reuvin Rivlin suggested that Israel might expel Arafat from the territories if he does not bring an end to the violence, AFP said.
"Arafat himself is saying that he is controlling everything on the Palestinian side. If he can't, let him leave Palestine," Rivlin said.
"Maybe we should send him far away from Gaza," Rivlin said, underlining that this was only a possibility.
But Palestinian Information Minister Yasser Abed Rabbo told AFP that the Palestinian Authority "strongly" condemned the attack, rejecting Israeli accusations that it was responsible.
"The government of Israel commits a big mistake when it points its accusation against the Palestinian National Authority (PNA)," Abed Rabbo said in a statement received by AFP.
"The path back to negotiations and to the end of all acts of violence, siege and settlement activity is the correct path," he said.
"We strongly condemn this act and do not consider any of the PNA's institutions responsible for this action," Abed Rabbo said.
A Palestinian Authority statement Friday night said: "We condemn this sort of attack, particularly when directed against civilians, and call on all parties to show restraint, avoid escalation and return to the negotiating table to establish a just and lasting peace."
FOREIGN LEADERS CONDEMN SUICIDE BOMBING
Foreign leaders across the world condemned Friday night's suicide attack, said reports.
German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer, who is currently on a visit to Israel, placed a wreath Saturday outside the nightclub where the attack took place, said Haaretz.
"The violence has to stop," Fischer said. "These were young people wanting to enjoy life and now they are dead."
Fischer was scheduled to meet later Saturday with Arafat.
After learning of the attack late Friday, Fischer expressed his condolences to Peres in a telephone call, the paper said.
In Berlin, German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder condemned the bombing but urged Prime Minister Ariel Sharon to continue the peace process.
"It is with anger and deep shock that I have just heard the news of the cowardly bomb attack in Tel Aviv," Schroeder wrote in a note to Sharon, cited by the paper.
"I condemn this terrorist attack, which has claimed the life of so many innocent people, in the sharpest terms."
"There is absolutely no justification for such an act," Schroeder said. "The cowardly perpetrator should not be allowed to succeed in throwing their country and the whole region into an even bigger catastrophe."
In Canberra, Australian Prime Minister John Howard urged Israel and Palestinians to prevent the bombing from sparking a further escalation of Mideast violence, AFP said.
“As both a friend of Israel and a supporter of the legitimate aspirations of the Palestinian people, I was appalled to learn this morning of the terrorist outrage overnight against innocent civilians in Tel Aviv,” Howard said in a statement.
“My heartfelt sympathies - together with those of my government and Australians everywhere - go out to the families and loved ones of those killed and injured in such horrific circumstances.”
French Education Minister Jacques Lang, who is also in Israel, visited the site of the bombing and vehemently condemned it.
In a statement published by his office, French president Jacques Chirac said that he was sickened by the bombing, and condemned it.
He said that France re-iterated the need for a complete end to the violence, and a resumption of negotiations, AFP said.
Russian President Vladimir Putin condemned the attack and said that it was a horrible, inhuman attack. He stressed the importance of a resumption to negotiations.
The European Union condemned in the strongest possible terms the suicide attack. Saying it was appalled by the deaths and injuries, the 15-nation EU urged the Palestinian Authority to do everything within its power to prevent terrorist attacks and to bring those responsible to justice.
The statement issued by Sweden, which holds the rotating EU presidency, also asked Israel not to take measures which result in a further escalation of the cycle of violence.
“Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat must demand an immediate end to the violence,” Sweden's Foreign Minister Anna Lindh said in a telephone interview with broadcaster TV4.
“Arafat has not been clear enough. It's important to bear in mind that Arafat probably doesn't have control over (the extremist) groups, but he must make this political signal that he wants an end to the violence,” Lindh said, cited by AFP - Albawaba.com
© 2001 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
