Nazir Majally, Arab News/Asharq Al-Awsat

OCCUPIED JERUSALEM, 15 March 2004 — Ten civilians were killed in a twin suicide attack in the southern port of Ashdod resulting in a long-awaited summit between the Palestinian and Israeli prime ministers being postponed indefinitely yesterday.

Around 20 people were also wounded when the two teenage bombers blew themselves up in an attack jointly claimed by the Palestinian groups Hamas and the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, police said.

“We have ten dead as well as the two bombers,” police spokesman Gil Kleiman told reporters at the scene.

Kleiman said most of the victims had died in a blast at a citrus fruit packaging factory inside the port while the remainder were killed in a secondary explosion at an office just outside the perimeter of the port.

An Israeli government spokesman said almost immediately that a summit between Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and Palestinian Premier Ahmed Qorei, which was expected to take place in just two days, could not be held in such an environment.

“I can confirm that this meeting will not take place in these conditions,” the spokesman said. “A meeting cannot be held in the midst of terror attacks.

“The purpose of such a meeting was to discuss the means of action against terrorism. Terrorist actions are currently speaking louder than words.”

Qorei and his government responded to the attacks with a statement saying, “We condemn the targeting of civilians on both sides and the continuation of the military escalation.” Such attacks worked against the Palestinian national interest as they served to give the Israelis an excuse “to continue their aggressions and build the wall,” it added in reference to Israel’s West Bank wall.

The Palestinian statement made no reference to the prospects of the summit.

Qorei had been expected to use the summit as a chance to grill Sharon about his plans to evacuate all but a handful of the settlements in the Gaza Strip.

Hamas and Al-Aqsa said that the two bombers both hailed from the Jabilya refugee camp in the northern Gaza Strip.

It is believed to be the first time that Palestinians from Gaza have carried out a suicide bombing since the start of the intifada in September 2000. Gaza has been sealed off from the rest of Israel by a massive wall. “This attack is to show Sharon that the wall in Gaza will not prevent the continuation of the struggle,” an Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades source said.

A member of the Brigades had said in an earlier phone call that the attack was a joint operation with Hamas. Hamas also claimed responsibility for the attack in a statement published on its website.

The Al-Aqsa source, speaking on condition of anonymity, named the two bombers as Al-Aqsa member Nabil Massud, and Mohammed Salem, from Hamas’ armed wing, the Ezzedine Al-Qassam Brigades. Both were aged 18.

A second Al-Aqsa source said that the attack was in retaliation for the killing of five Al-Aqsa members in Jenin on Wednesday.

News of the attack was greeted with celebratory rounds of gunfire in Jenin’s refugee camp, a stronghold of Al-Aqsa.

Senior Hamas figure Sheikh Said Siam said that “this operation is part of the resistance’s answer to all the crimes by the Zionist enemy which the world greets with silence. The Zionists continue their aggressions and massacres on our land as well as their assassinations and killings. This is a message that we can answer the aggressions and Zionist crimes deep in the heart of Israel.”

The Israelis say that any pullout from the West Bank will be on their terms but the Palestinians say that there must be coordination. Even before the Ashdod attack, senior members of Sharon’s government were lobbying against the plan.

Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom said yesterday the project could bring down the coalition government while Finance Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said it was “problematic”.

In Gaza itself, three members of Hamas were shot dead by Israeli forces. The three, all aged in their 20s, were killed by the road between the Karni border crossing and the settlement of Netzarim just south of Gaza City.

— Additional input from agencies