Israel targets Hamas leader in missile strike

Israel tried to kill a senior Hamas leader in Gaza City today, hitting his car with several missiles in an attack that wounded him, killed two bystanders and threw the future of a US-backed peace plan into doubt.

Abdel Aziz Rantisi, the most high profile political leader of the Islamic militant group to be targeted in 32 months of fighting, dived out of his Mitsubishi Pajero as the first missile struck. He was injured in the leg.

The Palestinian prime minister called the strike a “terrorist” attack, and US President George Bush said he was “deeply troubled” by the strike. Later today, three more Palestinians were killed by Israeli army fire.

Bush’s spokesman said the botched assassination bid will make it harder for Palestinian Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas to bring an end to the violence.

Israel confirmed it had tried to kill Rantisi, who it called an “arch-terrorist”, but said he was seeking to wreck peace efforts with new attacks on Israelis this week. It gave no proof of his direct involvement in terrorism.

Rantisi is a political leader of Hamas, and has been careful to deny any knowledge of the actions of the group’s armed cells.

Palestinian Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas, using unusually harsh language, said the strike was a “terrorist attack in the full meaning of the word because it targeted innocent people”.

As well as Rantisi, his son, three of his bodyguards and 22 bystanders were wounded, three of them critically.

The attack on Rantisi weakened Abbas, who has been criticised at home for pledging to end the “armed intefadeh” while getting little in return from Israel.

It came four days after Hamas broke off truce talks with the prime minister and two days after the group, with two other militias, killed four Israeli soldiers in a raid on a Gaza army outpost.

But some Hamas leaders said just before the strike that they were considering resuming truce talks with Abbas.

After the helicopter attack, Hamas threatened revenge.

“We will continue with our holy war and resistance until every last criminal Zionist is evicted from this land,” Rantisi, 55, told the Arab TV satellite station Al-Jazeera from his hospital bed.

Abbas accused Israel of trying to destroy the “road map” plan to get out of its commitments. The plan for peace and Palestinian statehood by 2005 was launched by Bush, Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon at a summit in Jordan last week.

Israel was certainly sending mixed messages with its actions today.

On one hand, troops dismantled 10 tiny uninhabited West Bank settlement outposts overnight, in line with the first road map requirements.

But the missile attack threatened to destabilise the situation badly and could be seen as a challenge to Washington’s efforts to get the peace plan off the ground.

The road map says Israel must refrain from actions that undermine trust, but does not specifically rule out the targeted killings of Palestinian militants.

However, Israel had indicated last month that from now on it would reserve the practice of targeted killings for “ticking bomb” scenarios – a last means of stopping attacks on Israelis.

Today’s attempt to kill Rantisi began before noon, when three Israeli Apache gunships appeared over Gaza City.

In quick succession, they fired seven missiles at Rantisi’s car as it drove along a busy street.

“I opened the door and jumped out,” Rantisi said later. “My son Ahmed was in the car, he was driving. I threw myself onto the ground. At the same time, my car was crashing into the wall.”

One of Rantisi’s bodyguards and a 44-year-old woman were killed, said Dr Moawiya Hassanain, director of Shifa Hospital.

Thousands of Hamas supporters crowded outside the hospital after the strike, chanting slogans against Abbas, also known as Abu Mazen. “Abu Mazen, we want resistance,” the crowded shouted.

“We will not give up. We will not cooperate with the Zionists.”

Dozens of Hamas gunmen fired their assault rifles in the air.

Another Hamas leader, Mahmoud Zahar, said there would be quick retaliation.

“The Hamas response will be like an earthquake,” he said.

When asked whether this would include targeting Israeli politicians, Zahar said: “An eye for an eye ... a politician for a politician.”

The Palestinians “must throw the road map into the garbage and commit to the map of holy war,” he added.