Tense Friday as a result of Bloody Tuesday
Palestine-Israel, Local, 3/13/1998

Israeli police and army forces reinforced their troops in the major West Bank cities, including east Jerusalem out of fear that massive violent demonstrations might break out after the Friday prayers.

But despite sporadic skirmishes in Hebron, the day passed relatively calmly as thousands of Muslim worshipers in Jerusalem left the Al Aqsa Mosque without any major clashes with Israeli police. In Hebron, however, angry Palestinians threw at least one explosive device and seven incendiary bottles at Israeli soldiers but caused no injuries, Israeli sources said.

Palestinian sources, meanwhile, said that nine youths were shot and wounded as Israeli soldiers fired live and rubber bullets to disperse stone throwers in the heart of the city, hotbed of some 400 Jewish settlers who were allowed to stay in the city under the January 1996 Hebron agreement between the Palestinian government and Israel.

Bereaved relatives of the three Palestinian workers whom Israeli troops shot dead last Tuesday night, said they would not be ready to receive Israeli peace activists who wished to express condolences but said that such an intention by Israeli prime minister Benyamin Netanyahu "is unacceptable." They were reacting to some reports that said Netanyahu considered visiting the village to express condolences but skipped the idea because of security hazards. In a televised statement on state-run television on Thursday night Netanyahu expressed his condolences to the families. ³The condolences expressed by Netanyahu have political significance, and thus Netanyahu should discuss his planned visit to the town with the leadership of the PNA,² said Ali, brother of Ghaleb Rajoub who was one of the three workers. Sitting in the mourning tent in Dura, both relatives and mourners of the three workers turned the occasion into a platform to condemn Israel's policies and to call for the continuation of the struggle against Israel, and blamed Netanyahu for the incident.

But the families of the three workers whose car came under a fatal barrage of bullets said they would welcome Israeli peace activists who had expressed their wish to visit the town. Some of those who arrived on Friday said an impartial body should be set to investigate what happened on "bloody Tuesday" because the Israeli army "investigating itself lacks credibility among Israelis, Palestinians, and everywhere else in the world."

The army, however, said that preliminary investigation into the incident showed there is room to assume that the bar attached to the gas pedal in the car had been welded incorrectly causing the jam of the car pedal and the accelerated mode by which the car drove seconds before it was brought to a halt by the soldiers fire. An examination of the vehicle showed it had undergone a number of other repairs, beyond the accelerator, without approval from the transportation ministry.

Previous Stories:
  European Union peace plan for Palestine disclosed   (3/13/1998)
  Palestine worried over continued unrest, European initiative in making   (3/12/1998)
  Women from Jerusalem and Gaza demonstrate   (3/10/1998)

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