The Israeli security services announced on Tuesday May 24 that they had dismantled a cell of the Palestinian group Hamas which was preparing anti-Israeli attacks, including the assassination of a deputy and leader of the far right.
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Five Palestinians from East Jerusalem, members of Hamas, were arrested in April for “
among other things planning shooting attacks against Israeli targets and public figures including MK Itamar Ben Gvir
”, reported the Shin Beth, the service internal security.
They also planned to bomb the Jerusalem light rail with a drone and abduct soldiers, the Shin Bet added in a statement, saying the drone had been seized.
A network 'aiming to cause trouble'
Three of the suspects, Rashid al-Richq, Mohammad al-Salayme and Hamza Abu Nab, were charged on Tuesday with membership in a "
terrorist
" organization, planning murder, kidnappings and bombings, as well as an attack on a police officer and for disturbing public order.
The other two, Soufiane al-Ajlouni and Mansour Safadi, will be charged soon, a Shin Beth spokesman told AFP.
One of the five men had also "
established a network of militants in Jerusalem aimed at causing unrest
" during Ramadan, the month of Muslim fasting which ended in late April, according to the same source.
In April, clashes between Israeli and Palestinian police left one dead and nearly 300 injured Palestinians on the esplanade of the Mosques in East Jerusalem, a Palestinian area occupied and annexed by Israel.
All five suspects took part in the "
riots
", the Shin Beth said, adding that some of them had undergone shooting training.
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Itamar Ben Gvir, an MP known for his inflammatory statements against the Palestinians, accused Prime Minister Naftali Bennett and Foreign Minister Yair Lapid in a statement on Tuesday of having "
encouraged violence against him
" in recent months.
Sworn enemies, Israel and Hamas, an Islamist movement in power in the Gaza Strip since 2007, have fought several wars, the last of which dates from May 2021.
