Israel 'softly softly' in suicide attack response

Israeli forces raided the West Bank town of Bethlehem today in response to a deadly Jerusalem bus bombing, surrounding the house of the assailant and searching nearby buildings.

Ten Israelis were killed and more than 50 wounded in yesterday’s suicide attack, the deadliest in four months.

Previous attacks have triggered large-scale Israeli military raids, but Israel this time appeared to have decided on a more measured response.

The Bethlehem incursion, the first in six months, was small in scale, and Israel did not clamp a closure on the West Bank and Gaza Strip, as it had done routinely in the past.

There were competing claims of responsibility for the suicide bombing, with Hamas announcing on its web site that it was behind the attack. Hours after the blast, however, the Al Aqsa Martyrs”

Brigades, an armed group with ties to Yasser Arafat’s Fatah movement, said it sent the bomber.

The target of the Bethlehem raid was the Aida refugee camp on the outskirts of town. Several dozen jeeps and armoured vehicles moved slowly through darkened streets in convoys, training spotlights on houses.

Soldiers ringed the house of the bomber, Ali Jaara, and appeared to be preparing it for demolition.

The military said only that an operation was in progress in Bethlehem and surrounding areas and that troops arrested several suspected militants. It was the first military operation in the city since troops left the town in July as part of a larger withdrawal called for under a US-backed peace plan.

Palestinian Cabinet minister Saeb Erekat condemned the raid. “Instead of sending soldiers and tanks to Bethlehem, Israel’s government should have sent negotiators to resume a meaningful peace process,” Erekat said.

Also today, troops shot and killed an Islamic Jihad member, Jihad Suwaiti, near the West Bank city of Hebron. The military said the man fired shots from a Kalashnikov assault rifle as soldiers came to arrest him, and troops returned fire, killing him.

In the Gaza Strip, a tank crew shot and killed two Palestinians. The military said it fired on a group carrying two explosive devices and rocket-propelled grenades near the Israeli settlement of Dugit shortly after midnight. Palestinian hospital officials said one of the men was wearing a military-style uniform and both bodies were badly disfigured by shrapnel.

Late last night, Sharon and Defence Minister Shaul Mofaz met to consider options after the bombing. Israel’s leadership was divided over how hard to hit back but appeared to have decided on a measured response.

The bomber, Ali Jaara, 24, was a Palestinian police officer – causing much chagrin within the Palestinian Authority, which has been under international pressure to use its police force to stop such attacks.