killed at least dozens of people and injured an estimated 150 others at Red Sea resorts in Egypt, near Israel’s border.
The most devastating attack occurred late Thursday at around 22:00 local time when a blast ripped through the Hilton Hotel in the resort town of Taba, just yards away from the border with Israel. Investigators said the blast is believed to have been caused by both a car bomb at the entrance to the hotel and a suicide bomber.
The Arabic television channel Aljazeera said one car laden with explosives rammed into the lobby of the hotel and detonated. Few minutes after the first blast a human bomber blew up near a swimming pool at the hotel, an Israeli official, who demanded anonymity, told Aljazeera.
Israeli radio stations claimed some of the hotel guests who were in their rooms at the time of the blast were also killed.
"There were a lot of people on the ground. We couldn’t tell in the chaos if they were dead or not," said Ronit Levi, who had been a guest at Hilton hotel, according to the Aljazeera internet website. "It was mayhem," Levi added.
HOTEL FLATTENED
Witnesses said the explosion completely flattened a 10-story wing of the 430 room Hilton hotel which Israel reportedly built when it invaded Taba from 1967 to 1989. Two additional explosions less than two hours later in the camping area of Ras Shaitan, located about 45 kilometers south (27.5 miles) killing two Israelis and wounding others, Magen David Adom rescue reported.
Up to 35 people were reportedly killed in the combined attacks; however the Israeli Foreign Ministry claimed that at least 39 Israeli guests of the Hilton hotel were still missing.
Israeli Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom told Israel’s Army Radio that Egyptian resorts were targeted late Thursday because "al-Qaida threatens all the countries, including Arab ones which according to it have close relations with Israel or the Western world."
Egypt was the first Arab country to sign a peace treaty with Israel in 1979.
NO PALESTINIANS
Israeli Deputy Defense Minister Zeev Boim said no Palestinian militant appeared to have been involved in the attacks. "In my opinion, it fits more with attacks by international terror groups like al-Qaida or branches of it," Boim said. “On the face of things, this is different from what we are familiar with from Palestinian terrorist groups.”
Earlier this month, al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden’s right-hand man al-Zarwahiri specified Egypt as a possible target when he called on young Muslims to attack Israeli and Western interests across the world, news reports said.
The previously unknown Jama’a Al-Islamiya Al-Alamiya (World Islamist Group) claimed responsibility for the Taba hotel blast, in a phone call to the French News Agency AFP. However, it was unclear whether the claim was authentic and what its relationship was to al-Qaida.
An Islamic internet site said four brothers carried out the Sinai attacks to avenge Israel’s killing of Hamas
leader Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, the Haaretz news paper quoted Army Radio as saying. However Hamas denied any involvement in the blasts.
HAMAS STRATEGY
"Hamas’s resistance strategy is very clear. It is in Palestine only," Fawzi Barhum, Hamas spokesman told Aljazeera.
"Our conflict with the Israeli-Zionist entity is because they occupied our lands, tarnished our sanctuaries and killed our people," he said according to the Aljazeera internet website.
The spokesman stressed that "Israel may try to lure Hamas" outside Palestine, but "we respect the Arab states and their leaderships, especially the neighboring countries," he added, speaking from Gaza.
Meanwhile the Israeli government asked Egypt to support its efforts to bring Israelis to safety and hospitals, even without passports, if needed. The attacks overshadowed the end of the Feast of Tabernacles, or Sukkoth, a Jewish Holiday mentioned in the Bible.
Thousands of Christians from over 80 countries also participated in the Feast in Jerusalem to express their support for what they see as Israel’s struggle for peace.
The Palestinian Authority has said the only way forward is to resume talks on the Roadmap for Peace, a U.S. backed peace plan that also envisages a Palestinian state. However the Israeli government says there is no partner to discuss peace as long as Palestinian Chairman Yasser Arafat remains in power in the Palestinian territory.
