[TIME] Tim McGirk - Just because fewer Palestinian terrorists are slipping into Israel from the West Bank doesn't mean that they have stopped trying. Says an officer in the Israel Defense Forces (IDF): "Our people sleep comfortably in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv because the IDF is putting in a huge effort, day and night, in the West Bank to prevent terror." Last year more than 6,650 suspected Palestinian militants were rounded up, among them, claim Israeli intelligence officers, 279 potential suicide bombers. IDF troops, in effect, prop up Mahmoud Abbas. Without the presence of Israeli troops, his advisers concede, the West Bank would soon fall to Hamas militants, just as Gaza did last June. Israel's domestic intelligence service, Shin Bet, claims that in 2007 it foiled 29 suicide attacks.
2008-03-14 01:00:00Full ArticleBACK Visit the Daily Alert Archive