Israeli police said Tuesday afternoon they arrested an armed Palestinian activist in the northern city of Haifa, carrying a bag containing a Kalashnikov rifle and bullet clips, whom they believed was planning to carry out a shooting attack. Police were also chasing a second man.
Palestinain sources identified the man arrested in Haifa as Wael Ahmed Jalamneh, 22, from Jenin. According to these sources, he is a memebr of Fatah-Tanzim group.
Elsewhere, four Palestinians were reportedly injured Monday night in exchanges of gunfire with Israeli troops in the Tel Sultan neighborhood of Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip, according to Palestinian sources.
At least three of the Palestinian casualties were unarmed civilians from one family unconnected to the gun battle. The Palestinian casualties include two children, a one-and-a-half year old girl and her nine-year-old brother, who were both moderately to seriously injured by stray gunfire. Their mother was also lightly wounded, Israel Radio reported.
The fourth casualty, an 18-year-old, was very seriously wounded in the gun battle.
Early Tuesday, Israeli soldiers backed by tanks detained two Palestinians when they entered a town in Palestinian-ruled territory in the Gaza Strip, a municipal official said, according to AFP.
The two, one of them described as a 45-year-old trader of animals, were arrested by a contingent of 20 soldiers and three tanks which entered the town of Wadi al-Salqa, said Yusef Abu al-Ajeen, head of the municipality.
The Israeli soldiers, who advanced about one kilometer into Palestinian territory, came from the nearby Jewish settlement of Kfar Darom, he added.
Retaliatory Strikes
Meanwhile, Haaretz daily reported that the Israeli army was ready Tuesday for reprisal raids against Palestinian Authority targets in response to three separate shooting attacks Monday in which three Israelis were killed and eleven injured.
The army was deploying to reimpose the blockade on Bethlehem, where security forces believe the gunmen who carried out the attack near the settlement of Nokdim, in which two settlers were killed, have taken refuge. The army was also planning to impose a blockade on Hebron, after another shooting attack Monday in which another settler was injured. (Albawaba.com)
