By Scott Shiloh Arutz Sheva October 17, 2005

Terrorists from the PA fired on a hitchhikers on Route 60 in Gush Etzion south of Jerusalem, killing three and wounding five. In a similar attack near Eli, north of Jerusalem, one Jew was wounded.

Two young women and one boy were murdered in the attack in Gush Etzion, as Arabs driving by opened fire at a bus stop used by hitchikers. Another five persons were wounded, among them, two seriously, one moderately, and one lightly.

The three dead are: Oz Yisrael Ben Meir, 14, from Moshav Maon; newlywed Matat Rosenfeld Adler, from Carmel; and Kinneret Mandel, 23, from Carmel.

Eyewitnesses say backpacks were strewn with victims’ blood at the intersection where the attack occurred.

“A Palestinian passed by in a car, let off a burst of fire, and struck down people standing at the hitchhiking post,” said Shaul Goldstein, head of the Gush Etzion Municipal Council, on Israel radio.

Goldstein told Israel TV: “Many people were murdered in the area since the outbreak of the Oslo war, but the army gradually gained control of the situation by closing down side roads adjacent to the highway which the Jewish civilians use. The IDF drastically reduced the attacks. Then, the political echelons suggested confidence-building concessions, which are always made by Israelis to the Arabs, including the opening of the side roads. We begged them not to saying that they will again be used as escape routes following murders of Jews. Today’s murders are the result of this policy.”

The Al Aksa Brigades, a terror group associated with the Fatah PLO faction claimed responsibility for the attack. PA chief Mahmoud Abbas is a member of the Fatah party that controls the Palestinian Authority.

Shortly after the attack in Gush Etzion, Arab terrorists driving a Hyundai opened fire on Jewish pedestrians walking on the highway between Eli and Shiloh in Samaria, north of Jerusalem. One person, wounded in his upper leg, was evacuated to the hospital.

Two vehicles were also hit in the Gush Etzion attack. The Arabs who were driving a Subaru have not been apprehended.

The Gush Etzion intersection where the attack occurred is located only a short distance from Bethlehem, an Arab-populated city controlled by the Palestinian Authority. Police suspect that the perpetrators fled to safe-haven in Bethlehem.

The tunnel road between Gush Etzion and Jerusalem that bypasses Bethlehem was closed following the attack.

David Baker, an official from the prime minister’s office, accused the Arabs of exploiting “humanitarian gestures,” including the removal of roadblocks, which Israel recently made toward the Arab population in Judea and Samaria. The gestures were made ahead of a summit that was supposed to have taken place between PA chief Mahmoud Abbas, and Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.

The meeting was called by Abbas when he accused Israel of not making enough significant concessions to the PA.

The IDF removed the roadblocks from roads like Route 60 where both of the attacks took place, despite the warnings of many in the security establishment that after Israel’s unilateral withdrawal from Gaza, PA terrorists would intensify their war in Judea and Samaria.

Among Abbas’ demands for the summit were for Israel to approve arming the PA with more rifles and armored personnel carriers. Senior IDF officials reportedly were in favor of approving Abbas’ demand. Abbas also demanded that IDF troops withdraw from Ramallah and Shechem, opening the way for PA forces to control these Arab-populated cities, much in the same way that the PA controls, Jericho, Bethlehem, and Tulkarem in Judea and Samaria.

Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz recently authorized PA troops in Tulkarem (located on the coastal plain near the suburbs of Tel Aviv), to rearm and openly display their weapons in the streets.

In another gesture recently approved to improve relations with the Palestinian Authority, IDF Chief-of-Staff Lt.Gen. Dan Halutz, ordered the IDF to halt targeting members of the Al Aksa Brigades. Halutz recently told a French newspaper that Israel had halted the attacks because the Brigades, who perpetrated today’s murders, had linked up with offical PA forces and were no longer targeting Israelis.

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