JERUSALEM - The second suicide bombing in two days in Jerusalem left at least seven people dead and 35 wounded on Wednesday, as Israel prepared to implement a new policy of seizing and holding Palestinian territory in response to terrorist attacks.
"Given the fact that the Palestinian Authority is doing nothing (to stop the attacks) we have to deploy our forces in such a way that (militants) won't be able to leave their launching pads," said Israeli spokesman Ranaan Gissin in an interview. "The best preventive measure is to bring the war into their own territory and to stop them there."
It was unclear how Israel would deploy its troops under the new policy. Israel ended a massive military operation in the West Bank in early May, but since then has regularly sent troops on short-term incursions into Palestinian cities.
Aides to Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat said the new policy would only cause further bloodshed and push militants to carry out more attacks.
"When they increase pressure on Palestinians it only increases the Palestinian resistance," Palestinian Labor Minister Ghassan Khattib said.
In Wednesday's attack, a bomber blew himself up at a crowded bus stop in the city's French Hill section. The stop, backed by the retaining wall of an elevated highway, sits on a busy, four-lane interchange at the northern entrance to the city.
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The force of the blast decimated the steel-framed bus shelter, leaving only a concrete bench where, moments earlier commuters, including a woman with a baby carriage, were waiting.
Emergency crews arrived to find the woman dead beside the carriage. The baby was taken to a nearby hospital.
Ultra-orthodox Jews stood behind police barricades and shouted, "Death to the Arabs . We want revenge," and held signs that read, "It's us or them."
A television station run by the militant Islamic group Hezbollah said the al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades carried out the attack, a militia linked to Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat's Fatah movement. The announcement taking responsibility for the operation reportedly included the statement: "Zionists, leave this land. We will not stop our operations as long as there remains an occupier on our land."
President Bush immediately condemned the attack, as did the Palestinian Authority.
Nissim Ze'ev, a member of the Israeli parliament from the conservative Shas party, said: "Why is it we always wait for condemnation by the Palestinian Authority? (The Israeli army) needs to go in and recapture the territories."
The comment was in tune with the policy announced Wednesday, under which Israeli troops would occupy parts of the West Bank under Palestinian control in an effort to put a stop to the wave of attacks.
"Israel will respond to every terror attack by capturing Palestinian Authority territory, which will be held for as long as the terror continues," Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said in a statement. "Additional terrorist attacks will bring about the capture of additional territories," the statement said.
Israeli government advisor Dore Gold said the policy is "a way for Israel to deploy in certain areas to make infiltration by terrorists more difficult."
Knight Ridder-Tribune
