By Stan Goodenough
Dec 16, 2005
Terrorists fired automatic weapons at a car traveling south of Hebron Friday afternoon, critically wounding an Israeli man.
Efforts to save the 35-year-old father of five, a resident of the Jewish town of Bet Haggai, failed. He succumbed to a bullet wound in his head and was pronounced dead on his arrival at Jerusalem?s Hadassah Ein Kerem Hospital.
Two women hitchhikers traveling with the man were being treated for shock.
The killers fled into Palestinian Authority-controlled areas before IDF forces arrived on the scene.
Credit for the attack was jointly claimed by PA chairman Mahmoud Abbas? Fatah faction of the PLO and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad.
A Knesset Member, Uri Ariel, said responsibility for the attack should be placed at the door of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz.
?Sharon and Mofaz approved the entry of armed Palestinians into the area in order to secure [Palestinian] Authority elections despite repeated warnings this was dangerous,? Ynet quoted Ariel as saying.
?Sharon must immediately remove the gunmen that continue to endanger the lives of those traveling on the roads.?
Today?s attack came exactly one month after Arabs fired on young Israelis at a hiking station in Gush Etzion, murdering two women and a boy.