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Last update - 00:00 26/10/2001
Israeli terrorism
 

An Israeli terrorist cell conducted another attack against Palestinians on Wednesday. Six residents of Yata, south of Hebron, who were on their way to work, were wounded by shots fired at them from an Israeli car. The commander of the Samaria and Judea District Police says he believes the attack was committed as an act of revenge for attacks on Israelis in the territories. It was the sixth or seventh such attack by an Israeli cell against Palestinians since the spring; so far, six people have been killed and more than 20 wounded in these incidents.

The Shin Bet and the security forces believe there are at least two Israeli terrorist cells operating in the West Bank with the mission to kill Palestinians out of revenge or as a deterence. The cells have been operating for several months without the Shin Bet managing to track them down or arrest any of their members.

The length of time and freedom of action these terrorists have enjoyed raises questions about the effort being made to capture them. The Shin Bet has lately recorded many successes in solving the cases of attacks against Israelis and finding their Palestinian perpetrators. The most important of these was the successful probe of the assassination of Tourism Minister Rehavam Ze'evi within hours after the murder and finding the assassins within a few days. There is no reason to suspect that the Shin Bet is deliberately not trying to uncover Jewish terror or that the Israeli government has instructed the Shin Bet to invest less than a full effort to put an end to this terrorism. Nonetheless, one cannot ignore the firm impression that the authorities have failed over and over again in their attempts to uncover the Jewish perpetrators of these attacks.

All terrorists need a supportive environment to operate and find shelter from their pursuers. The community around these Israeli terrorists also knows who they are and where they come from. Presumably, if they are extremist believers, they have a spiritual authority who gives his blessing to their actions. The Yesha rabbis and Yesha council have repeatedly issued condemnations of the attacks and their perpetrators, but their authority is apparently limited and is insufficient to impose a moral or political discipline over the entire Jewish population in the territories. And one can also not expect that these institutions will do everything they can to expose the terrorists.

The Shin Bet must devote all its efforts to uncovering and foiling these terrorists and not assume that their community will reject them or hand them over. The response to Israeli terror attacks against Palestinians must not be only a shrug. Condemnations of these attacks cannot replace capturing the terrorists and punishing them under the law. Success at exposing and foiling Palestinian terrorism cannot cover up the failure in uncovering the Israeli terrorists
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