Suicide bomber's home destroyed again

The Israeli army blew up the house of a suicide bomber in the West Bank town of Nablus today, the second time the family’s home has been destroyed in revenge.

The army, which routinely demolishes bomber’s homes as a deterrent, said it destroyed the home of Sabih Abu Saud’s family to show those involved in attacks “that their actions have a price.”

Abu Saud became the youngest suicide bomber in three and a half years of conflict when he blew himself up in the West Bank village of Azzoun last November – just days after his 16th birthday.

The demolition came 18 years after the military razed the family’s home after Abu Saud’s uncle killed a Palestinian suspected of collaborating with Israel, said Abu Saud’s father, Kamal.

“This is the second time they have destroyed our home,” Kamal Abu Saud said, adding that all he managed to salvage from his home were his clothes and his television set.

But he said that, in some ways, the demolition came as a relief after months of uncertainty.

“I have been waiting for them to come … every time a jeep went by I would be afraid, but now it is over,” he said.

After his son blew himself up, lightly wounding a soldier who had been hunting for him, Kamal Abu Saud criticised the Al Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades, the militant group that sent him.

“He was just a little boy and those who sent him should have left him alone,” he said at the time.

Now he sees his son’s death and the destruction of his homes as a point of pride and he only regrets that his son did not carry out a more deadly attack. “If he had been bigger, maybe he would have been a better fighter,” he said.

His son who was born a year after the first house was destroyed was named after a benefactor who helped them rebuild the family home, he said.

“I hope people will help us now,” he said.