Israel threatens Syria for ‘directing Hamas attacks’

ISRAEL accused Syria yesterday of “directing terrorism” and warned it could face pre-emptive strikes against militants on its territory, but stopped short of saying it killed a Hamas leader in Damascus.

Syria had accused Israel of terrorism following the Palestinian militant’s death in a car bombing on

Sunday, three weeks after 16 Israelis were killed in bombings Israel blamed on Hamas exiles in Damascus.

Israeli deputy Defence Minister Zeev Boim said Syria was “a central junction in regional terrorism”, and President Bashar al-Assad “works there as the traffic officer”.

“Syria is responsible for directing this terrorism against us and therefore it cannot be immune to our operations aimed at preventing terror,” Mr Boim said on Israel Radio.

Asked whether Israel was behind the killing of Izz el-Deen al-Sheikh Khalil, aged 42, who Palestinian sources said headed Hamas’s military wing outside the West Bank and Gaza Strip, Mr Boim said: “I didn’t say that. We don’t confirm or deny this.”

Channel Two television quoted unnamed security sources as saying Israeli agents had planted the bomb which tore apart Khalil when he turned the ignition of his car.

Syria’s state news agency quoted an official source on Sunday as saying: “This terrorist act represents a grave development for which Israel shoulders responsibility as it stresses its intent to shake regional security and stability.”

Hamas threatened to retaliate in an accelerating cycle of violence that threatens to complicate Israel’s planned evacuation of settlers and soldiers from occupied Gaza in 2005.

Militants have cranked up ambush attacks in the past few weeks, keen to cast any Israeli pullout as fleeing under fire, and citing Israel’s intent to hold on to larger settlements in the West Bank as a trade-off for jettisoning the Gaza Strip.

A US-backed “road map” peace plan envisions Palestinian statehood in the West Bank and Gaza, lands Israel seized along with Syria’s Golan Heights in the 1967 Middle East war. But persistent violence on both sides has shredded the road map.