A Palestinian suicide bomber blew himself up on Wednesday, slightly wounding two Israeli soldiers near a kibbutz on the edge of the Gaza Strip on Wednesday, Israeli army radio said. Meanwhile, Israel weighed responses to the assassination of Tourism Minister Rehavam Zeevi, amid settlers' calls for the "elimination" of Palestinian President Yasser Arafat.
The bomber infiltrated a few hundred meters (yards) into Israeli territory near Nahal Oz kibbutz and lay in wait to strike as an Israeli patrol drove by in a jeep.
The two soldiers hurt were taken to a hospital in southern Israel while the army combed the area of the attack for other bombs, the radio reported, cited by AFP.
Meanwhile, the Tel Aviv-based Haaretz newspaper reported that the Israeli cabinet was meeting Wednesday night to decide on measures in the wake of the killing of Zeevi. Defense Minister Benjamin Ben-Eliezer will also meet Wednesday evening with the heads of the security establishment to decide on possible measures to be taken in response to the killing.
The inner security cabinet decided Wednesday to freeze all contacts with the Palestinian Authority until it "ends violence," and to "step up" the military response to terror attacks. The inner cabinet, however, did not take a decision to carry out assassinations of Palestinian political leaders beyond the 40-odd individuals already targeted and killed.
The government has also barred Arafat from using the Gaza airport, said the paper on its internet edition.
The Palestinian Authority condemned the assassination and President Arafat has ordered the arrest of those behind the assassination, which was claimed by the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine.
Reports said the PFLP spokesman in Ramallah was arrested on Arafat’s orders.
Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres urged Arafat to rein in such actions, warning that all peace hopes were now in peril.
"All our efforts will go up in smoke if Arafat does not arrest Palestinian militants," Peres said, after Zeevi was gunned down in Jerusalem by the PFLP in revenge for the assassination of its own leader, Israeli radio reported, said AFP.
Peres, in a statement issued by his ministry, said he was "stunned" by the "sordid murder" of Zeevi.
"Despite ideological differences," the dovish foreign minister paid tribute to the tourism minister's "courage, determination and sense of responsibility during the many years that he spent in the army."
Peres, the main architect of the 1993 Oslo peace accords, has already called on Arafat several times to arrest Palestinians accused of "terrorism" by Israel.
Earlier, Israel suspended all contact with the PA and reinstalled the blockade it had partially lifted off the Palestinian lands as Prime Minister Ariel Sharon blamed Arafat for the killing.
"I hold Arafat fully responsible, inasmuch as he set the terrorism in motion, even though he knew very well what the consequences would be," Sharon told a special session of the Knesset convened to pay respects to the slain minister and former general.
"We will wage a war without mercy against the terrorists" Sharon warned. "Only criminal terrorists could dream of assassinating elected members of a democratic state," he added.
US URGES BOTH SIDES TO STAY ON PEACE PATH
The United States on Wednesday urged Israel and Palestinians to keep moving forward on the path toward peace despite the assassination of Zeevi.
"It would be a tragedy if the terrorists were able to derail that process," said State Department spokesman Philip Reeker, as quoted by the agency.
"So we want the Palestinians and the Israelis to continue with the positive steps that they've recently embarked on to improve the situation and begin to restore some measure of cooperation," he said.
He added, however, that the killing was "a despicable act of terrorism that we condemn in the strongest terms," and called on Arafat to find the perpetrators.
"[President] Arafat and the Palestinian Authority must move now to find and arrest all those responsible for this act as well as to continue arrests of other known terrorists," Reeker added.
PA BLASTS ZEEVI KILLING, ISRAELI ASSASSINATIONS
The Palestinian Authority condemned the killing of Zeevi, as well as Israel's own policy of political assassinations in the year-old intifada or uprising against 34 years of military occupation.
"The Palestinian Authority rejects completely and condemns all acts of assassination," a statement said.
"We give our condolences to the Israeli government," it added.
The Palestinian Authority asserted its opposition to "assassination on all levels, even in the case of Zeevi, the radical one," the statement said, alluding to Zeevi's extremist ideology in favor of expelling all Palestinians from the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
The PA also reaffirmed its commitment to the ailing ceasefire agreement hammered out between Arafat and Peres on September 26.
"The Palestinian Authority confirms its decision in favor of a complete ceasefire and will do what they have to do in these matters according to the law," it said.
EU CONDEMNS 'COWARDLY ASSASSINATION’
The European Union condemned "in the strongest terms" the "cowardly" assassination, saying "this criminal act will not interrupt the most recent efforts of the Israeli and Palestinian authorities" toward peace.
France, Britain and Germany, joined by the European Commission, quickly spoke out, expressing shock and condemnation of the killing.
The attack "will most certainly slow down efforts for the Middle East peace process," a European Commission spokesman said, cited by AFP.
EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana himself said Wednesday "I would like to condemn in the strongest possible terms the assassination this morning of Rehavam Zeevi."
Britain's Prime Minister Tony Blair, who earlier this week met in London with Arafat, said "we condemn utterly this contemptible act of violence."
He urged "restraint on all sides in response to the men of violence who only want to wreck any proposals for peace.
On Monday, the British prime minister had given his most public support yet for a "viable" Palestinian state, which would coexist peacefully alongside Israel.
German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer, due to embark on a new peace mission to the Middle East next week, expressed his dismay and conveyed his condolences to Peres and Zeevi's family.
LEBANON'S REFUGEES DANCE WITH JOY
Hundreds of Palestinians in Lebanese refugee camps danced with joy as they celebrated the assassination, said agencies.
Streaming in from all corners of Ain El Helweh camp in southern Lebanon of 60,000 residents, jubilant Palestinians gathered in front of the PFLP offices there.
Flashing the "V for victory" sign, they shouted "mabruk," the Arabic word for congratulations.
PFLP activists handed out sweets, while youths waved the Palestinian and PFLP flags.
Others, wearing T-shirts emblazoned with the portrait of slain PFLP leader Abu Ali Mustapha, formed circles, arms round each other's shoulders, and danced the dabka.
"Our heroes have avenged Abu Ali Mustapha and the martyrs of the Intifada killed by Zionist bullets," said Hussein, a 55-year-old grocer, who closed his shop to join the "party."
PFLP spokesman Abu Talal told AFP in Ain El Helweh that "the heroic action of our fighters is a normal response to the crimes perpetrated by Sharon against Abu Ali Mustapha and the heroes of the Intifada."
Mustapha was killed on August 27, when Israeli helicopter gunships blasted his Ramallah office with missiles as part of a policy of eliminating alleged "terrorists."
The PFLP had sworn that the assassination would not go unpunished.
ISRAELI CABINET REBEL RECONSIDERS RESIGNATION AFTER MURDER OF ALLY
Israel's National Infrastructure Minister Avigdor Lieberman said Wednesday he was considering withdrawing his resignation from the government after the slaying of Zeevi, his fellow cabinet right-wing rebel.
"After this attack, we are asking ourselves what Rehavam Zeevi would have done, and we will reach a decision very soon," said Lieberman, who tendered his resignation Monday, together with Zeevi, in protest at the government's peace moves.
Their resignation had been due to come into effect at 1:30pm (1130 GMT). The pull-out of their ultra-nationalist bloc had been strongly opposed by Sharon, who would nonetheless have retained a comfortable majority in the Knesset.
Lieberman, head of the Russian-immigrant Israeli-Beitenu which was allied in parliament with Zeevi's National Union, said: "The reality has changed. It is impossible to carry on as if nothing had happened."
JEWISH SETTLERS DEMAND 'ELIMINATION' OF ARAFAT
Jewish settlers demanded that Israel "eliminate" Arafat in revenge for the slaying of the right-wing politician, a champion of the Jewish settlements illegally built in the Palestinian territories.
"The first thing which needs to be done is the elimination of the Palestinian Authority and Yasser Arafat," David Wilder, spokesman for the ultra-Orthodox settlers in the West Bank city of Hebron, epicenter of the radical settler movement, told AFP.
When asked if he was calling for the army to assassinate Arafat, Wilder said: "Yasser Arafat is the head of a snake that represents practices of terror. If you don't chop off the head of the snake, it continues to attack and kill."
HAMAS: ISRAEL REAPS WHAT IT SOWS
Hamas cheered the slaying of Zeevi as the consequences of Israel's policy of assassinating Palestinian leaders during the year-old intifada.
"I think the reasons for the shooting of Zeevi was Sharon and his policies, which included the assassination of political leaders and children," said Hamas leader Abdel Aziz Al Rantissi, whose own group has been battered by Israel's policy of gunning down political leaders.
"Who started killing political leaders? The Jews. And now they pay the price," Rantissi added.
"They chose to be killed. We accept this game." - Albawaba.com
© 2001 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
