Two days, two bombers

Associated Press

JERUSALEM – A suicide bomber blew himself up at a northern Israeli junction early today, killing himself but no one else, Israeli media reported.

Police could not immediately confirm the reports, but Israeli media reported there were no other casualties from the blast.

On Sunday, shortly after a warning of a suicide attack, a Palestinian bomber disguised in an Israeli army uniform slipped into a produce market in Netanya and blew himself up, killing three Israelis and wounding at least 50 others.

Hours later, Palestinians said several Israeli armored vehicles rolled into part of the West Bank city of Ramallah, where Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat’s office is headquartered.

The troops withdrew a short time later, without any contact with Palestinians, an army spokeswoman said.

In the hours before the Sunday blast, Israeli security forces had been on alert in the Netanya area after receiving information that a suicide bomber was preparing an attack. But the bomber, who died in the explosion, was wearing an olive green Israeli army uniform – a common sight on Israeli streets – and that may have helped him avoid notice.

“It appears he arrived with someone else who dropped him off at the market,” a police spokeswoman said. “He moved through the stalls until he found some place to blow himself up.”

Netanya has been frequently targeted by Palestinian militants. On March 27, an attack in a Netanya hotel killed 29 people at the beginning of the Jewish Passover holiday, and Israel responded with a sweeping offensive in the West Bank aimed at dismantling the militant groups in the Palestinian autonomous zones.

Israel Television reported that army intelligence believes the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine carried out the bombing.

The suicide bombing led Bush administration officials to renew demands that Yasser Arafat rein in Palestinian militants, though they acknowledged Arafat cannot control all of them.

“I think there clearly is a class of bombings that he can’t” rein in, Vice President Dick Cheney said.

“On the other hand, there have in the past been bombings by elements of Palestinian organizations that come under his control, and there he clearly has the capacity to act,” Cheney told NBC’s “Meet the Press.”