2008 Dimona suicide bombing

2008 Dimona bombing
The attack site
Location	Dimona, Israel
Coordinates	31°03′52.23″N 35°02′03.57″E / 31.0645083°N 35.034325°E / 31.0645083; 35.034325
Date	February 4, 2008
Attack type	suicide attack
Death(s)	1 Israeli civilian (+ 2 bombers)
Injured	9 Israeli civilians
Perpetrator(s)	Two Palestinian assailants. The al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades and the PFLP claimed responsibility

Dimona

The 2008 Dimona bombing was a suicide attack carried out by the militant organizations al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades and Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine in Dimona, Israel on February 4, 2008.^[1]

The attack

On February 4, 2008, a Palestinian militant detonated an explosives belt at a shopping centre in Dimona, Israel.

The Israeli police managed to shoot dead an accomplice which was wounded in the first blast before he could detonate his own belt.^[1]

One Israeli woman was killed in the attack while nine other people were injured (one of them critically).^[1] It was the first 'successful' suicide attack against Israeli civilians since the Eilat bakery bombing on January 29, 2007.

Fatalities

The sole person killed in the attack was 73-year-old Lyubov Razdol'skaya (Russian: Любовь Раздольская). Along with her husband, Edward Gedalin (Russian: Эдуард Гедалин), she moved from Tbilisi, USSR to Israel in 1990. Both worked in the GSSR Academy of Sciences Institute of Physics. After moving to Israel they worked in the physics department of Ben-Gurion University of the Negev and retired in 2002. Gedalin himself was critically injured in the attack and hospitalized at Soroka University Medical Center in Beer Sheva.^[2][3]

The perpetrators

The perpetrators were identified as Luay Laghwani (aged 22) and Musa Arafat, both from the city of Khan Yunis.^[1][4] They are believed to have travelled either from the Gaza Strip through the Sinai, or from the Palestinian city of Hebron in the West Bank.

Israeli retaliation

On July 26, 2008, IDF and Israeli police forces killed Shihab Natsheh, a 25 year old Hamas member from Hebron who, according to the IDF, was the explosives engineer that prepared the demolition charge used to carry out the Dimona suicide bombing.^[5][6]

Government reactions

Involved parties

•  Israel: Prime Minister Ehud Olmert told a meeting of his Kadima party that Israel was fighting a "relentless war... against anyone who tries to harm Israeli citizens".^[1]

•  Palestine: Hamas spokesman Ayman Taha praised the bombing as a "glorious act" and said that it was a "natural reaction to months of killing" of Palestinians by the Israeli military.^[1][4] Mahmoud Abbas, President of the Palestinian National Authority, condemned the attack.^[1]

International

•  United Kingdom: Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs David Miliband condemned the attack in a press release and said: "Today’s attack, the first in Israel for a year, aimed to undermine the peace process. Terrorist atrocities must not deflect us from our shared goal of just and lasting peace between Israelis and Palestinians based on a two state solution".^[7]

•  United States: Department of State spokesman Sean McCormack condemned the attack during a press briefing and said: "All of these incidents point to the fact that we need to do everything that we possibly can, along with our partners in the international system, to help the Israelis and the Palestinians come to a political agreement and accommodation on the issues that separate them. At that point, the Palestinian people will be able to decide which pathway they want to go down; do they want to go down the pathway of having a Palestinian state or do they want to continue down a pathway represented by Hamas and other rejectionist groups that's a pathway of violence and that does not lead to a state".^[8]

External links

• Suicide Attackers Hit Southern Israel - published on CBS News on February 4, 2009
• Suicide bomber strikes at Israel - published on The Daily Telegraph on February 4, 2009
• Israel sees first suicide attack in a year - published on USA Today on February 4, 2009
• Hamas Admits To Israeli Suicide Attack - published on Sky News on February 4, 2009
• Two suicide bombers carry out attack against Israeli civilians in Dimona - published at the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs

References

1. ^ ^{a b c d e f g} McCarthy, Rory (2008-02-06). "Hamas says it was behind suicide blast in Israel". London: The Guardian. http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/feb/06/israelandthepalestinians.international. Retrieved 2009-10-29. 
2. ^ "Расследование теракта в Димоне. Противоречивые версии" (in Russian). February 5, 2008. http://newsru.co.il/mideast/05feb2008/dimona_102.html. Retrieved 2010-09-13. 
3. ^ http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3503262,00.html
4. ^ ^{a b} Copans, Laurie (2008-02-04). "First suicide attack in a year in Israel". Associated Press. http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080204/ap_on_re_mi_ea/israel_palestinians;_ylt=At5TVs2Z7tR9wcmB1SSIl6as0NUE. Retrieved 2008-02-04. ^{[dead link]}
5. ^ "IDF kills terror mastermind in Hebron". ynet. 2008-07-27. http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3573486,00.html. 
6. ^ "Israeli troops in Hebron kill Hamas man behind Dimona attack". Haaretz. 2008-07-28. http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1005817.html. 
7. ^ "David Miliband condemns suicide attack in Israel" (Press release). Foreign and Commonwealth Office. 2008-02-04. http://www.fco.gov.uk/servlet/Front?pagename=OpenMarket/Xcelerate/ShowPage&c=Page&cid=1007029391638&a=KArticle&aid=1199209016526. Retrieved 2008-02-05. 
8. ^ "Daily Press Briefing". United States Department of State. 2008-02-04. Archived from the original on 2008-02-09. http://web.archive.org/web/20080209203335/http://www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/dpb/2008/feb/100004.htm. Retrieved 2008-02-04.