KARKUR JUNCTION, Israel, 22 October — A car bomb ripped apart a packed bus in northern Israel, killing at least 14 people and wounding nearly 50 others, jeopardizing the latest peace push by Washington and Europe. The Islamic Jihad movement claimed the blast in an anonymous telephone call to AFP from the West Bank town of Jenin, saying it was a "martyrdom operation", or suicide attack.
Palestinian President Yasser Arafat condemned the bombing, saying he was against "the killing of civilians on both sides," but an Israeli official said Arafat bore ultimate responsibility for the attack and said no peace initiative could go forward as long as he led the Palestinians.
The White House and European Union also denounced the attack, which coincided with a peace mission to the region by Washington’s top Middle East envoy William Burns aimed at drumming up support for an international plan to set up a Palestinian state by the end of 2005.
A jeep-type vehicle loaded with between 60 and 80 kilograms of explosives and cans of petrol and with two people aboard blew up beside the bus near the town of Pardes Hanna, between Tel Aviv and Haifa, police said.
An Israeli police spokesman said at least 14 people had been killed and 48 others wounded. Bus driver Haim Avraham said from his hospital bed that the blast came as he had stopped to take on passengers at Karkur Junction, just south of Pardes Hanna near the coastal town of Hardera.
"A car exploded alongside us and the whole bus was thrown in the air," he told public television. He said there were some 30 passengers aboard the Egged company bus, which was on its way from Kiryat Shmona, in the north, to Tel Aviv. Passenger Michael Yitzhaki, who was sitting behind the driver, told public radio he saw people burn to death inside the bus.
The attack occurred less than 10 kilometers from the West Bank, where the army has reoccupied most towns in a bid to foil Palestinian attacks. The reports said 30 people had been hospitalized in Hadera, several in serious condition, four in Afula and four in Meggido.
The explosion came as progress was reported on a "road map" for a peaceful settlement to the two-year Israeli-Palestinian conflict being drawn up by the diplomatic quartet of the United States, Russia, EU and the United Nations. But Zalman Shoval, the hawkish Israeli Premier Ariel Sharon’s foreign policy adviser, told reporters: "Before we can embark on any road map, there must be an absolute end to terror and violence and this is contingent on a change in the Palestinian leadership. We hold him (Arafat) responsible by direct commission or omission" for the latest bombing.
EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana said he had conveyed his "personal distress and my strongest condemnation, which is total and unreserved" to Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres, who was in Luxembourg for talks with the 15-nation bloc. "Difficult as it might seem at times such as these, what Israelis and Palestinians need more than ever is less blood, and more commitment to re-establish a fruitful cooperation that should lead to dialogue and peace," Solana said.
Arafat, under pressure at home and abroad to reform his administration, yesterday postponed the announcement of a new Palestinian Cabinet as he weighed conflicting demands on its makeup. Aides to the Palestinian president had originally said he would unveil his new government by yesterday, but they said he delayed the appointments because he needed more time to decide.
Meanwhile, the Simon Wiesenthal Center has written to British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw demanding the recall of the British ambassador to Israel for "holocaust revisionism". The center accuses Sherard Cowper-Coles of describing Israel as turning the West Bank and Gaza into a "vast concentration camp". The ambassador on Sunday night denied using any such language and expressed anger at what he said was the misrepresentation of a friendly warning delivered to Israel at Whitehall’s behest.
The center’s letter follows remarks by Cowper-Coles to the Israeli general overseeing administration of the West Bank in which the ambassador was reported in the Israeli press as calling the Palestinian territories the "largest detention camp in the world". Cowper-Coles also told Maj. Gen. Amos Gilad that some Israeli troops maltreated civilians after the ambassador made a tour of the West Bank.
Israel’s Foreign Ministry leaked the comments to the Israeli press last week. Officials were quoted as saying: "The ambassador has forgotten that the British mandate is over. He went too far." But the Simon Wiesenthal Center, based in California, has taken the issue further by calling for Cowper-Coles’ recall.
