IHT: Abbas cuts ties with militants

	Abbas cuts ties with militants
	AP	Wednesday, August 20, 2003

Palestinian leader calls bus bombing a 'terrible crime'

JERUSALEM With the latest Middle East peace plan hanging in the balance, the Palestinian prime minister, Mahmoud Abbas, broke off contact with the Islamic militant groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad on Wednesday in response to a bus bombing in Jerusalem that killed at least 20 people, including up to six children.

Israel decided to hold off on a major military strike in response to the bombing, a security official said.

The attack Tuesday was one of the deadliest in three years of fighting, and about 40 of the more than 100 wounded were children. The blast ripped through a bus packed with ultra-Orthodox Jewish families returning from the Western Wall, Judaism's holiest shrine.

Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and top defense officials decided Wednesday to give the Palestinian security chief, Muhammad Dahlan, some time to begin cracking down on the militants, as Israel has long demanded, the security official said. Speaking on condition of anonymity, the official said Israel would not wait long and expected to see action Wednesday.

Dahlan met with Palestinian security commanders in the Gaza Strip on Wednesday. A spokesman said a decision on possible action against those involved in the bombing would be made at a meeting of the Palestinian cabinet later in the day.

Abbas, who could lose his job if violence persists, was meeting with Islamic Jihad leaders in Gaza City on Tuesday evening when he received word of the bombing.

Condemning the attack as a "terrible crime," he convened an emergency cabinet meeting. He also called off trips to Italy and Norway, initially planned for later this week.

Abbas, who has said he will not confront the militants because he fears internal fighting, is now under growing pressure to take strong action, as required by the U.S.-backed peace plan known as the road map.

In the Gaza Strip, Hamas leaders insisted Wednesday that they remained committed to a three-month truce they and other militants declared unilaterally on June 29, but they said they reserved the right to take revenge for the killing of operatives by Israeli troops.

There were some indications that the bomber, who had disguised himself as an ultra-Orthodox Jew, had also tried to settle a personal score with the attack. The assailant, Raed Mesk, a 29-year-old mosque preacher from the West Bank city of Hebron, was a friend of an Islamic Jihad leader in Hebron, Muhammad Sidr, who was killed by Israeli troops last week.

Israel is expected to intensify its hunt for wanted militants if the Palestinian security forces do not take action, but a major military strike, on a par with last year's offensives in response to bombings of a similar scale, is not being considered, the Israeli defense official said.

In the meantime, Israel froze all contacts with the Palestinian Authority and canceled the planned handover of two West Bank towns to Palestinian control, a move that had been expected later this week. Israeli soldiers also closed border crossings to seal off the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

A Palestinian legislator, Saeb Erekat, criticized Israel's decision, saying it was important to maintain contacts. "Every possible effort should be exerted to keep the road map and the truce alive," he said.

The ambassadors of the European Union, Italy and Ireland laid a wreath Wednesday against a tree and lit 18 candles - matching early estimates of the number of dead - on a site close to where the bomber struck. The bombing drew statements of condemnation and condolences from the United States, the European Union, Britain and the United Nations.

A bloody street scene

James Bennet of The New York Times reported earlier from Jerusalem:

The Palestinian suicide bomber detonated an explosive packed with ball bearings on Tuesday night aboard a city bus crowded with families.

The blast resounded across Jerusalem as it peeled up the roof of the bus and blew out its windows, smearing human remains on a tour bus ahead and opening a deep wound in the U.S.-$ backed peace effort.

Men carrying blood-spattered children raced toward approaching ambulances. On a street strewn with broken glass and bloodied sheet metal, a man knelt near the shattered bus to perform mouth-to-mouth resuscitation on a toddler.

Later, in a hospital here, Yaacov Bahar, 35, held his hands in the air in front of him, as though he were still carrying an infant, as he described helping bring four children from the bus.

"In my eyes, I'm still seeing the nightmare," said Bahar, who was being treated for shock.

The attack on Tuesday night was claimed by members of both Hamas and Islamic Jihad. The Israeli police said the bomber was from Hamas.

Israeli officials reacted to the bombing with fury on Tuesday night, and expressed frustration toward a peace plan they said was endangering their security.

"Israel cannot be the perpetual testing ground for peace proposals that the Palestinians fail to implement," said Dore Gold, an adviser to Sharon.

In Gaza City, Abbas told reporters, "I declare my strong condemnation of this horrible act that doesn't serve the interests of the Palestinian people."

Abbas said he offered "my real sorrow" to the families of the victims of the bombing.

Israeli officials noted that Israel had recently softened its own demands on the Palestinian leadership, insisting only that it supervise the men Israel considers terrorists and prevent them from committing new attacks, rather than putting them in jail. The bombing appeared certain to renew Israeli and U.S. pressure on Abbas to take more forceful action against militant groups.

Since June 29, Hamas has claimed responsibility for only one other lethal suicide bombing, killing one Israeli a week ago in retaliation for Israel's killing days earlier of two Hamas militants.

In a videotaped statement, the bomber who committed Tuesday night's attack attributed it primarily to an incident from before the cease-fire was declared, the Israeli Army's killing in June of a local Hamas leader in Hebron.

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