Hamas leader killed by Israeli missile Thousands of Hamas supporters gather in streets Saturday, April 17, 2004 Posted: 3:35 PM EDT (1935 GMT) *Abdel Aziz Rantisi was appointed interim leader of Hamas after the group's founder, Sheik Ahmed Yassin, was killed in an Israeli airstrike in March. GAZA CITY (CNN) -- Abdel Aziz Rantisi, the leader of the militant group Hamas in Gaza, was killed on Saturday in Gaza City by an Israeli missile strike, Israeli officials and Palestinian security sources said. An Israeli helicopter launched the strike on Rantisi's car in Gaza City, the sources said, killing two others -- one of them a bodyguard. Rantisi was rushed to a hospital, where he died shortly afterward. An Israeli Foreign Ministry official confirmed that the missile strike was a targeted killing. Israeli Foreign Ministry official Gideon Meir said this was not the first time Israel has targeted Rantisi. "We tried to do it a few months ago. At that time, he managed to run away. This time we got him," Meir said. "Somebody who is sending suicide bombers to kill innocent Israelis is a legitimate target for the government of Israel," he told CNN. Ten other people were injured, Palestinian medical sources said Immediately after news of the killing swept through the territory, thousands of Hamas activists, in shock and panic, spilled into the streets. Chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erakat condemned the killing saying: "We hold the Israeli government fully responsible for the consequences of such actions. "At the end of the day violence will breed more violence, hatred will breed more hatred." Rantisi was appointed to head Hamas in Gaza after Hamas founder and spiritual leader Sheikh Ahmed Yassin was killed last month in an Israeli missile strike in Gaza City. It was not clear if Rantisi's car -- which was engulfed in flames -- was attacked by aircraft or had been booby-trapped. A huge explosion was heard in Gaza City and half of the city lost electricity. TV footage showed hospital doctors frantically working on Rantisi. Suicide attack The move comes hours after a Palestinian suicide bomber launched an attack in the Erez industrial zone Saturday, killing a border police officer and wounding three others. Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades and Hamas claimed responsibility for that attack. An Al Aqsa spokesman identified the bomber as Fadi al-Amudi of Beit Lahiya, located in northern Gaza near Erez. An Israeli army official said the bomber had worked in the zone for the last two years. He died at the scene. A second attacker, from Hamas, tried but failed to enter the industrial zone, an Al Aqsa source said. The military said it knew nothing about a second bomber. Both groups have conducted previous terrorist attacks against Israeli civilians. There is heavy security around the busy industrial area, where the bomber detonated explosives at an entrance where the workers are checked before they can go to their jobs. At least 2,900 entered Erez Saturday. The zone was closed as a result of the bombing, and it is not known when it will reopen. Many Palestinians have jobs there. The attack came three days after President Bush met with Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon in Washington. Bush endorsed Sharon's plan to withdraw all Jewish settlements and troops from Gaza and all but six blocs of Jewish settlements from the West Bank. (Full story) Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat on Thursday rejected the plan (Full story) It was closed for several days in January after a female suicide-bomber killed four Israelis at a checkpoint leading to the Erez industrial zone. Ten people were wounded in the blast.
Amazing thing is that this is the lead stopry, under a red banner " Breaking News" on the BBC, on all Canadian news channels I've seen, etc. but on MSNBC, FOX, and CNN they have been going with regular programming, including a show on house decor...
No no, I've been watching CNN international, and it has been on for a long while now and still going... Interesting what WE get to see and what YOU get to see though..
How long? I turned off CNN about 2o mins ago, after watching BBC coverage of this for over an hour, and they were still doing an ecomonics program.
You don't get the CNN, I don't think so at least. CNN was the 3rd station to catch it, a couple of hours ago. Still going on right now..
Weird...CNN here is playing "Dollar Signs"... Anyways, for what it's worth, the BBC has interviewed several people about this, from both sides of the aisle. Here are the interesting notes so far: * Several Palistinians, including a few who are completely opposed to the suicide bombings or violence of any kind say that Rantisi has been the voice of reason within Hamas for quite a while, angling for a more political solution rather than a military one, and all confirmed that he had been trying to quash any repisals over Yassin's assassination, asking instead for Palestinians to wait and see if the Israelis follow through with their planned departure of Gaza. There was much discussion about the fact that any Palestinian leader who tries to be moderate is, they feel, making himself an immediate target for Sharon's people, who seem to want the extremists in control to therefore excuse their agenda. * In his last interview with a BBC journalist, Rantisi predicted his own assassination, and said he looked forward to being a martyr, as his end would be a decision of Allah, not Shoaron, whatever the means of his demise. He himself said it was inevitable that he would be assassinated, citing the fact that Israel has assassinated every past leader of Hamas, and 'thousands' of Palestinain leaders overall. * The Israeli spokesman said that this action was in keeping with the current Israeli policy, one which was reinforced with Sharon's meeting with Bush, of "letting all terrorists know that they will have no safe havens, and will have justice brought to them if they were not first brought to justice." He said that Bush fully supported this policy, and this with the other unprecedented shift in US policy towards the conflict indicates to many that the US has thrown off pretenses of being impartial in this conflict, as evidenced by the fact that the US recently came to decision re: Palestine and Israeli polciy without even consulting Plaestinan leadership, which is a first. * While has has been trying to portray himslef as a politician rather than a military leader, Rantisi is, according to Israel, a master of terrorism. They claim that he has been behind many suicide bombings in the past, and although Rantisi is said to have preferred non-violent means behind closed doors, he has never condemmed suicide bombers in pulbic, saying that they were manifestations of the real evil, the occupation. No direct links were avowed to exist between Rantisi and any attacks that were discussed, but the Israeli spokesman said that the lines wee there, beneath the surface. * All sides were in agreement, on the BBC, that this will lead nowhere good. If Israel is indeed interested in peace, it was observed that this was a foolhardy move, akin to shooting itself in the foot. Whther or not Israel is interested in peace was very much a matter of debate, although some claimed that this was Sharon's response to the hard liners in Israel who oppose his pull out, and is seen as a means of showing them that he won't let Israel be seen as pulling out under fire. More as it develops...
Who cares? People under the PLO, Hamas, Hezbollah, Al-Qaeda, etc. banner deserve what they get. They are extremists. If they truely want peace, they'll say what they need to say without the use of weapons, but the ones who do want peace without conflict are the minorities versus the idiots who have the majority and tote anything from rocks to rockets. If they truely want peace, they'll wash their hands of the blood caused by the PLO and Hamas and come out and denounce the terrorism their own people are creating.
Shame on Israel. Sadly some innocent Israelis will be killed in retaliation. I just saw an Israeli spokesperson CNN. He said they did this "so that they can have a meaningful peace process"
But now, more of them will be killed. Hamas will never die. They will appoint stubborn leader after stubborn leader. But each killing of these leaders increases suicide bombing attempts. Israel doesn't want peace.
Maybe they want peace but peace isn't an option while Hamas still calls for the destruction of Israel in it's charter.. Place the blame where it is supposed to be please.
it's only a matter of time before Hamas and the Arab states get the weapons of their choice. then, it's going to be open season on all Israeli leaders, with maybe a couple thousands of innocent civilians as "unavoidable collateral damage" alongside them. and when the Israelis protest their prosecution, the Palestinians/Arabs can all look back on this day, and the thousands of days of this brutal occupation, and say "what comes around, goes around." do i believe in poetic justice? maybe not. but neither do i believe Israel will stay on top of the middle east forever. if the people of that country don't democratically change their govt policies in a hurry, they are going to get what's coming to them and it ain't going to be pretty.
There are only about 3.3 million Palestinians. Eventually they will run out of potential replacements for the job of leader of Hamas. Even if 10% of the population was willing to take on a suicide job like that, after you kill 330,000 of them, there are none left. It is a war of attrition, and one that the Palestinians can't win. Once they realize that, they will revise what they are willing to accept, and then there can be peace.
DaDa I love the analogy. I love the whole Palestinian thing. Palestinians are just Arabs and Persians who took the title Palestine to be used for themselves. Prior to 1948, no Arabs ever called for a "Palestinian" state. Once Israel made plans to be a sovereign nation, they all flipped out because Arabs hate Jews. I'm not saying ALL Arabs hate Jews, but just the vast majority of them and especially those who support the Hamas and Hezbollah and the like. In 70 AD, the Romans were fed up with the Jews rebellion and refusal of the Roman religious practices. They renamed the land "Palestine" which is a Latin form of "Philistine" just to spite the Jews. Whose land is it? By law and right, it is the Israelis. If the PLO and Hamas get their hands on high tech weaponry, the Israelis will not stand by and get destroyed. No matter if a left wing or right wing PM is in office of Israel, they will retaliate with extreme force. The Israelis don't play these games. After the 1972 Olympic murders of Israeli athletes, the Mossad was authorized to hunt down and assassinate all Arabs directly involved. The Israelis will not back down. They have no reason to. The land is theirs and has always been theirs.
