25/07/2004
Palestine Media Center – PMC
Israel’s Security Minister warned Saturday of a possible attack on Al-Aqsa Mosque compound in Israeli-occupied Jerusalem, Islam’s third holiest site, by Jewish terrorist groups seeking to derail Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s plan to unilaterally “disengage” from the Gaza Strip.
Israeli security officials told Ha’aretz daily that an attempt to crash a plane packed with explosives on Al-Aqsa was one of the scenarios drawn out by the terrorists.
“We have a considerable amount of disquieting information according to which it is not only academic ideas but concrete projects,” the Israeli Internal Security Minister Tzahi Hanegbi said, without elaborating.
His comments follow a report by Israel’s secret service that there is an increasing threat of an attack on Sharon by right-wing groups who oppose his plan, nine years after the assassination of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin by a Jewish terrorist late in 1995.
“The level of threat (of an attack) on the Temple Mount (Al-Aqsa Mosque compound) by Jewish extremists and fanatics, in order to ... be a catalyser for the change of the entire political process, has risen during the past few months, especially during the last few weeks, more than ever before,” Hanegbi said.
Hanegbi was speaking to Israel’s Channel 2 television’s “Meet the Press” program on Saturday.
The Al-Aqsa Mosque in occupied east Jerusalem is known to Muslims as al-Haram al-Sharif, or the Holy Sanctuary, and is revered by Jews as the “Temple Mount,” which they claim to be the site of two ancient biblical temples.
The Jewish extremists would take advantage of the fact that the shrine served as “the most sensitive, most volatile, most sacred site for Muslims” in order to attack either the mosque itself or its Muslim worshippers, Hanegbi said.
“There are troubling indications of purposeful thinking, and not detached philosophy... There is a danger that [extremists] would make use of the most explosive site, in the hope that a chain reaction would bring about the destruction of the peace process,” he added.
Earlier this month, Hanegbi warned against the threat of a major political assassination in Israel by Jewish extremists.
Attempt to Crash Explosives-packed Drone on Al-Aqsa
The Shin Bet security service and the police are preparing for a number of possible terror attack scenarios at the sacred Old City site, Israeli security sources said on Saturday night, Ha’aretz reported Sunday.
The newspaper quoted sources saying that possible actions included an attempt to crash a drone packed with explosives on Al-Aqsa compound, or a manned suicide attack with a light aircraft during mass Muslim worship on the compound.
Other possibilities include an attempt by right-wing Jewish extremists to assassinate a prominent Al-Aqsa Muslim leader, perhaps from the Waqf Islamic trust.
The aim of the Al-Aqsa attack conspiracy would be to carry out a visible provocation that would spark violent confrontation in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, the Israeli security sources told Ha’aretz.
Sharon’s visit to the compound four years ago sparked violent clashes with Muslim worshippers that set off the ongoing Palestinian Intifada (uprising) against the 37-year old Israeli occupation of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.
Sharon plans to push forward with his plan to re-deploy Israeli troops and settlers from the Gaza Strip, where more than 7,500 illegal Jewish settlers live in heavily-guarded enclaves among 1.3 million Palestinians, by the end of 2005.
Jewish settlers are meanwhile planning to form a “human chain” on Sunday stretching some 90 kilometers (55 miles) from the Gaza Strip to Jerusalem and called at the weekend for thousands of Israelis to take part.
The demonstration is part of a campaign by settlers against Sharon’s plan.
A spokesman for the illegal “Gush Katif” settlement bloc in the Strip said Saturday “tens of thousands of people,” would join the chain.
The human chain was set to start at the foot of Jerusalem’s Al-Buraq Wall (known to Jews as the Wailing Wall, and claimed to be the holiest site in Judaism).
Old, Grassroots Jewish Terrorism
In the early 1980s, the Shin Bet security service broke up a Jewish clandestine, terrorist group that was planning a large-scale attack on Al-Aqsa compound in order to torpedo the peace accord with Egypt and prevent the dismantling of illegal settlements on the Sinai Peninsula.
Yehuda Etzion, one of the terrorist leaders of a plot in the early 1980s to blow up Islamic mosques, said Sunday that blowing up the Dome of the Rock, the gilded mosque at the center of Al-Aqsa Mosque compound, was a “worthy” goal, but that it was not the proper way to fight the disengagement initiative, Ha’aretz reported.
“Losing one’s patience after so many years of distortion is something understandable,” Etzion told Army Radio. “Is this a worthy act? First of all, it is worthy. On the other hand, it is unworthy as an act to thwart the disengagement.”
In 1982, American-Israeli Alan Goodman staged a shooting spree outside the mosques, killing two Palestinians and touching off days of rioting.
Earlier Warnings
Hanegbi’s warning was the latest in a series of warnings by Israeli officials.
Last week, the head of Israel’s internal security service said that as many as 200 Jewish settlers want to see Prime Minister Sharon dead because of his Gaza plan, although Shin Bet chief Aviv Dichter claimed that his agents had not uncovered any specific assassination plot.
Speaking to the Knesset’s Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee, Avi Dichter said most of the extremists on the list lived in illegal West Bank settlements, although there were also a small number in the Gaza Strip, according to Israel Radio.
“The Shin Bet chief was very clear in his comments. Dozens of people, with the support of some 150 others, want the death of the prime minister, in fact his assassination,” MP Ran Cohen of the opposition Meretz Party told the radio.
“These people are armed, they are found in several settlements, (Dichter) must stop them,” he said.
On July 5, Israel’s parliament called for a debate on the threat posed by Jewish extremists opposed to settlement evacuation, and Prime Minister Sharon for the first time acknowledged publicly that he feels at risk.
Dichter’s warnings struck a deep chord because many Israeli politicians and security officials still blame themselves for ignoring the warning signs ahead of the 1995 assassination of then-Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin by an Jewish terrorist.
Nine months ago, Shahar Dvir-Zeliger, a suspect in a Jewish underground terror group affair, told authorities a prominent West Bank settler activist had planned a “Temple Mount attack.” Zeliger cited two other names of West Bank settlers, suggesting the two were involved in the attack conspiracy.
Last Thursday, the so-called “Temple Mount Faithful” group petitioned the High Court, asking to be given clearance to go up to the Holy Site for prayers later this week.
Palestine Media Center – PMC
Israel’s Security Minister warned Saturday of a possible attack on Al-Aqsa Mosque compound in Israeli-occupied Jerusalem, Islam’s third holiest site, by Jewish terrorist groups seeking to derail Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s plan to unilaterally “disengage” from the Gaza Strip.
Israeli security officials told Ha’aretz daily that an attempt to crash a plane packed with explosives on Al-Aqsa was one of the scenarios drawn out by the terrorists.
“We have a considerable amount of disquieting information according to which it is not only academic ideas but concrete projects,” the Israeli Internal Security Minister Tzahi Hanegbi said, without elaborating.
His comments follow a report by Israel’s secret service that there is an increasing threat of an attack on Sharon by right-wing groups who oppose his plan, nine years after the assassination of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin by a Jewish terrorist late in 1995.
“The level of threat (of an attack) on the Temple Mount (Al-Aqsa Mosque compound) by Jewish extremists and fanatics, in order to ... be a catalyser for the change of the entire political process, has risen during the past few months, especially during the last few weeks, more than ever before,” Hanegbi said.
Hanegbi was speaking to Israel’s Channel 2 television’s “Meet the Press” program on Saturday.
The Al-Aqsa Mosque in occupied east Jerusalem is known to Muslims as al-Haram al-Sharif, or the Holy Sanctuary, and is revered by Jews as the “Temple Mount,” which they claim to be the site of two ancient biblical temples.
The Jewish extremists would take advantage of the fact that the shrine served as “the most sensitive, most volatile, most sacred site for Muslims” in order to attack either the mosque itself or its Muslim worshippers, Hanegbi said.
“There are troubling indications of purposeful thinking, and not detached philosophy... There is a danger that [extremists] would make use of the most explosive site, in the hope that a chain reaction would bring about the destruction of the peace process,” he added.
Earlier this month, Hanegbi warned against the threat of a major political assassination in Israel by Jewish extremists.
Attempt to Crash Explosives-packed Drone on Al-Aqsa
The Shin Bet security service and the police are preparing for a number of possible terror attack scenarios at the sacred Old City site, Israeli security sources said on Saturday night, Ha’aretz reported Sunday.
The newspaper quoted sources saying that possible actions included an attempt to crash a drone packed with explosives on Al-Aqsa compound, or a manned suicide attack with a light aircraft during mass Muslim worship on the compound.
Other possibilities include an attempt by right-wing Jewish extremists to assassinate a prominent Al-Aqsa Muslim leader, perhaps from the Waqf Islamic trust.
The aim of the Al-Aqsa attack conspiracy would be to carry out a visible provocation that would spark violent confrontation in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, the Israeli security sources told Ha’aretz.
Sharon’s visit to the compound four years ago sparked violent clashes with Muslim worshippers that set off the ongoing Palestinian Intifada (uprising) against the 37-year old Israeli occupation of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.
Sharon plans to push forward with his plan to re-deploy Israeli troops and settlers from the Gaza Strip, where more than 7,500 illegal Jewish settlers live in heavily-guarded enclaves among 1.3 million Palestinians, by the end of 2005.
Jewish settlers are meanwhile planning to form a “human chain” on Sunday stretching some 90 kilometers (55 miles) from the Gaza Strip to Jerusalem and called at the weekend for thousands of Israelis to take part.
The demonstration is part of a campaign by settlers against Sharon’s plan.
A spokesman for the illegal “Gush Katif” settlement bloc in the Strip said Saturday “tens of thousands of people,” would join the chain.
The human chain was set to start at the foot of Jerusalem’s Al-Buraq Wall (known to Jews as the Wailing Wall, and claimed to be the holiest site in Judaism).
Old, Grassroots Jewish Terrorism
In the early 1980s, the Shin Bet security service broke up a Jewish clandestine, terrorist group that was planning a large-scale attack on Al-Aqsa compound in order to torpedo the peace accord with Egypt and prevent the dismantling of illegal settlements on the Sinai Peninsula.
Yehuda Etzion, one of the terrorist leaders of a plot in the early 1980s to blow up Islamic mosques, said Sunday that blowing up the Dome of the Rock, the gilded mosque at the center of Al-Aqsa Mosque compound, was a “worthy” goal, but that it was not the proper way to fight the disengagement initiative, Ha’aretz reported.
“Losing one’s patience after so many years of distortion is something understandable,” Etzion told Army Radio. “Is this a worthy act? First of all, it is worthy. On the other hand, it is unworthy as an act to thwart the disengagement.”
In 1982, American-Israeli Alan Goodman staged a shooting spree outside the mosques, killing two Palestinians and touching off days of rioting.
Earlier Warnings
Hanegbi’s warning was the latest in a series of warnings by Israeli officials.
Last week, the head of Israel’s internal security service said that as many as 200 Jewish settlers want to see Prime Minister Sharon dead because of his Gaza plan, although Shin Bet chief Aviv Dichter claimed that his agents had not uncovered any specific assassination plot.
Speaking to the Knesset’s Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee, Avi Dichter said most of the extremists on the list lived in illegal West Bank settlements, although there were also a small number in the Gaza Strip, according to Israel Radio.
“The Shin Bet chief was very clear in his comments. Dozens of people, with the support of some 150 others, want the death of the prime minister, in fact his assassination,” MP Ran Cohen of the opposition Meretz Party told the radio.
“These people are armed, they are found in several settlements, (Dichter) must stop them,” he said.
On July 5, Israel’s parliament called for a debate on the threat posed by Jewish extremists opposed to settlement evacuation, and Prime Minister Sharon for the first time acknowledged publicly that he feels at risk.
Dichter’s warnings struck a deep chord because many Israeli politicians and security officials still blame themselves for ignoring the warning signs ahead of the 1995 assassination of then-Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin by an Jewish terrorist.
Nine months ago, Shahar Dvir-Zeliger, a suspect in a Jewish underground terror group affair, told authorities a prominent West Bank settler activist had planned a “Temple Mount attack.” Zeliger cited two other names of West Bank settlers, suggesting the two were involved in the attack conspiracy.
Last Thursday, the so-called “Temple Mount Faithful” group petitioned the High Court, asking to be given clearance to go up to the Holy Site for prayers later this week.
