Egypt arrests would-be Hamas suicide bomber near Israeli border

[oberliner]

Egyptian authorities have detained a would-be Hamas suicide bomber next to the Israeli border as he was awaiting instructions to carry out a terrorist attack inside Israel, an Egyptian security official said Monday.

Earlier Monday, Hamas claimed responsibility for shooting an Israel Electric Corporation worker near the Karni crossing between the Gaza Strip and Israel, moderately wounding him.

Salah Adnan Saleh Abdel-Salam was arrested after he left a mosque in the border city of El-Arish in the Sinai Peninsula, police said.

The 21-year-old Palestinian student was interrogated by Egyptian police and confessed to belonging to Hamas, which he said intended to provide him with an explosive belt and instructions to cross into Israel, according to Captain Mohammed Badr of the North Sinai Peninsula police unit.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/839422.html

[cali]

1. Not that I'm condoning this in any way but if Israel

hadn't taken such a hard line about not dealing with the Unity Government, would this even be happening?

[msmcghee]

2. What examples from the past . .

. . would lead you to believe that it wouldn't be happening?

[cali]

4. That Hamas has had a moratorium on such attacks

since they were elected.

[msmcghee]

5. I forgot about that.

It is confusing though. I'm not sure how it works there or if this is correct but I thought Hamas was responsible in some ways for the rockets being fired from N. Gaza. (Maybe they just looked the other way.)

But if that is the case then I take it you are suggesting that they have renewed their support of suicide attacks against Israel because Israel has recently come out against the proposed Unity government.

I'm not sure I see a strong connection there but thanks for explaining. You could be right.

[oberliner]

6. What about the Eilat bakery suicide bombing?

That was on January 29th of this year.

[cali]

7. That wasn't Hamas

Islamic Jihad and Al-Aqsa took credit for it.

[eyl]

8. A moratorium which has not gone unbreached

and as noted elsewhere in this thread, a suicide bombing attack takkes some time to prepare.

[cali]

9. So what?

So does the invasion of Lebanon, for example. It's called contingency planning, and in and of itself, doesn't mean much.

[eyl]

10. It's not static enough to be a contingency plan

Consider (part of) what needs to go into organizing a suicide bombing:

1) You need to get/create the raw materials
2) Assemble them into a bomb
3) Get someone willing to blow him/herself up.
4) Plan a route for them to get to their target

The first two can be done ahead of time, though the larger your "stockpile", the better the chance it will be discovered. #4 is problematic, but usually doesn't take as long to revise. #3 is the kicker, though. Suicide bombers don't just up and decide to kill themselves one day; they take preperation "psyching up", if you will). That preparation takes time but can't just be turned on and off at will. So the "go/nogo" decision on this was taken some time ago.

[cali]

11. That's less than convincing

Who's to say that Hamas and other organizations don't have quite a few suicide bombers prepared to attack when given the go ahead? Anyway, more to the point, what do you think of Israel's refusal to talk with the new Unity Government?

[eyl]

12. Exactly my point

you can't just keep a suicide bomber "in reserve" and then let him loose on a moment's notice; it takes preparation before his attack.

As for your question, I'm in two minds about it, to be honest. On the one hand, I can see the ISraeli government's point. OTOH, refusing to talk doesn't lead anywhere either. I guess what I would do is do a "low level" dialogoue with the non-Hamas members for a while, and see if in practise the new government is giving the previous agreements and ceasing of terror more than lip service (reserving my right to terminate contact if that isn't the case)

[sabbat hunter]

3. suicide bomb planning

usually takes some doing, this attempt probably was planned well before the unity government was announced.