The IDF commander in Nablus, Col. Amir Baram, said on Thursday evening that all of the terror operatives involved in a planned suicide attack on central Israel had been caught, Israel Radio reported. In addition to the terrorists arrested throughout the day, Baram said, many other terror suspects have been detained, and the main part of the three-day operation is over. However, IDF troops will not yet leave the Ein Beit Ilmeh refugee camp, he said. Earlier Thursday, paratroopers and soldiers of the Haruv Battalion detained three Hamas men who were planning to carry out a suicide bombing in the center of Israel. The arrest was made as part of a wide-scale raid on the Nablus refugee camp of Ein Beit Ilmeh. In all, 37 fugitives were detained in the camp in the past three days.
The members of the group arrested Thursday afternoon were a man planning to enter Israel with a suicide vest, a recruiter and a man whose role was to drive the attacker to his intended target.
Earlier Thursday, the army was investigating Palestinian claims that an IDF bulldozer ran over the body of a 17-year-old Palestinian youth who was killed by shrapnel earlier Thursday near the El-Bureij refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip. Dr. Moaiya Hassanain of the Health Ministry in Gaza identified the youth as 17-year-old Mahmoud Kassassi. No terror groups claimed him as a member. The left side of Kassassi's face was crushed. According to the IDF, no official complaint about the incident has yet been filed with the Gaza Liaison Administration.
The army also reported that ground troops and armored vehicles have been operating in northern Gaza since early morning in an attempt to locate weapons smuggling tunnels and Kassam rocket launchers.
In another incident, two Hamas gunmen were injured on Thursday in clashes with IDF troops on the Gaza border, Palestinian officials said. Hamas said one of its men was critically wounded and another moderately. The IDF said it had conducted a brief incursion into Gaza and exchanged fire with gunmen, hitting one of them.
Elsewhere, IDF soldiers operating in Nablus arrested two senior officials in the Fatah-allied Aksa Martyrs Brigades, Palestinian sources reported. The two were not wanted by Israel, and may have been arrested by mistake, Israel Radio reported, adding that one of the two had been wearing women's clothing.
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