ECONOMIC BRIEFS
SDEROT, GILO UNDER ATTACK; TOP HAMAS TERRORIST ARRESTED
Five people were being treated for shock after three Qassam rockets fired from the Gaza Strip landed in a residential area in the Negev town of Sderot this afternoon, HA'ARETZ reported. Sderot has been the target of several Qassam attacks in recent weeks. On Sunday night, the southern Jerusalem neighborhood of Gilo came under Palestinian gunfire for the first time in more than five months. No injuries or damages were reported.
Meanwhile, for the second time in two days, the Israel Defense Forces carried out an overnight counter-terrorist mission moving deep into the Gaza Strip in order to target Hamas' terrorist infrastructure. Sheik Mohammed Taha - one of five original founders of Hamas - was arrested during the operation, becoming the most senior terrorist to be detained since Palestinian violence erupted 29 months ago. Six other terrorists - including four members of the Taha family- were also apprehended during the raid and taken in for questioning. IDF forces demolished the house of Sami Abdul Salam, one of the homicide bombers behind the attack in Gush Katif on February 9 in which four soldiers were wounded.
The houses of Mahsan Fuad Alur (a terrorist stowing weapons for Hamas) and Hassan Hassnin (an Islamic Jihad member) were also destroyed. The army withdrew from the Gaza Strip at the end of the operation. Eight Palestinians were killed in gun battles with IDF soldiers. Minister of Defense Shaul Mofaz said on Sunday that the army would step up strikes against Hamas. "We want to arrive at a situation where the terror organizations invest more and more (effort) defending themselves," he said.
Also today, Israeli forces entered the Kasbah area in central Nablus, and arrested a number of Palestinians wanted for questioning.
In other news, the Tel Aviv District Court sentenced an Israeli Arab to ten years in prison today for planning to bring two Palestinian homicide bombers into Israel to carry out an attack in Petah Tikva in November 2001.
ISA THWARTS HAMAS PLOT TO BOMB SHARON'S CONVOY
Israel Security Agency revealed on Sunday that it arrested a Bethlehem-based Hamas terror cell last month which planned to bomb Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's convoy during one of his visits to the West Bank, YEDIOT AHARONOT reported. According to security sources, the cell gathered detailed intelligence on Sharon's movements, prepared a precise plan of attack and collected weapons. The ISA thwarted the plot after it arrested cell member Fadi Mortajia who confessed he was receiving instructions from Hamas leaders in the Gaza Strip. Mortajia also admitted to being involved in numerous shooting and bombing attacks in the Bethlehem area, including rigging a donkey with explosives that blew up on January 26 near a bus but did not cause casualties. His arrest led to the capture other cell members and security forces said they were still searching for more accomplices to the cell. Mortajia revealed the cell had other terror plans including the attack on a synagogue and the launching of mortar against Jerusalem.
According to the ISA, Israeli security forces thwarted 57 terrorist attacks during the month of February, including 44 in which would-be homicide bombers and their dispatchers were arrested. The majority of which were affiliated with the Fatah's Tanzim, 12 with Islamic Jihad, and 12 with Hamas.
CABINET MINISTERS ASSUME THEIR NEW RESPONSIBILITY
Twenty of the newly appointed ministers of Israel's 30th government assumed the responsibilities of their new posts today, HA'ARETZ reported. The first meeting of the Government is scheduled to take place this Tuesday. The incoming ministers have been asked to present the Cabinet with the most pressing issues on their agendas as well as a timetable for completion of their immediate goals.
Minister of Finance Benyamin Netanyahu and Minister of Foreign Affairs Silvan Shalom attended a changing of the guard ceremony at both their respective ministries. Netanyahu enters his new role with two stated primary goals: to formulate a broad emergency economic plan to stabilize the Israeli economy, and to continue negotiations to secure a $12 billion aid package from the U.S. Shalom said that he was handing Netanyahu an economy that was beginning to show signs of recovery. "The economic figures publicized in the past two months prove that an economic recovery has begun," Shalom said.
At the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Netanyahu's team prepared an extensive training package for Shalom, including recommendations on the Ministry's future direction, information on the status of the Middle East following an Iraqi war, and suggestions on the management of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. Shalom is expected to plan a U.S. visit to discuss the American-backed road map peace initiative.
In a symbolic move, Avraham Poraz, who took over the Ministry of Interior from Eli Yishai today, decided to grant, on his first day in office, a three-year temporary resident permit to Natasha Senikova, whose son was killed in the Tel Aviv Dolphinarium terrorist attack in 2001.
Meanwhile, three new ministers - two from the National Religious Party and one from Likud partner Yisrael b'Aliyah - are to be sworn into office today. From the NRP, party chairman Effi Eitam and Zevulun Orlev will take office, after the party's central committee voted Sunday to place them respectively in the Ministry of Housing and Ministry of Welfare. Natan Sharansky will act as Minister without Portfolio responsible for Jerusalem and diaspora affairs.
In other news, the Likud Knesset faction chose Yuval Steinitz today as the new chairman of the Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee. The Likud faction has already decided who will head a variety of posts: MK Michael Eitan will become head of the Constitution, Law and Justice Committee; MK Gila Gamliel will serve as chair of the Committee for the Advancement of Women; MK Abraham Hirchson will head the Finance Committee.
ISRAELI-AMERICAN TO DESIGN NEW WTC SITE
Daniel Libeskind, the architect chosen to design the complex, which will stand on the site of the World Trade Center, holds a joint Israeli-U.S. citizenship, ISRAEL21C reported. Libeskind, who currently lives in Berlin, said he did not discount the chapter of his life spent in Israel nor his Jewish roots. "I am still an Israeli," he said.
He recently noted in a German newspaper that parallels for his plan for rebuilding Ground Zero in Manhattan can be found in Jerusalem's Temple Mount. Keeping in mind the deep sensitivities of victims and their families, Libeskind said that Ground Zero must be viewed as hallowed land which is also part of ongoing history - like the Temple Mount, the site in Jerusalem sacred to Moslems as the Dome of the Rock. "There are precedents, the Temple Mount for example," he said. "It is one of the most positive places in the world and yet a site of utter destruction. We must accept that September 11 is irreversible. We can never return to the time before then. The question now is: How can we transform this insight into something positive?"
Libeskind's project includes the construction of the world's tallest building at the World Trade Center site and a memorial to the victims of September 11, 2001. The plan for the building on the WTC site contains a "Matrix of Heroes" that will radiate outward from a central plaza. Its lines would trace the routes taken by firemen, policemen and rescue workers as they entered the site on September 11. But they will also extend upward and out toward the horizon to include all citizens in "the matrix of life."
Libeskind was born in Poland to Holocaust survivors and in 1957 his family moved to Israel. They later relocated to New York. His current project list includes a Jewish museum in San Francisco, a convention center at Bar-Ilan University, extensions to museums in Denver and Toronto, the interior of Copenhagen's Jewish museum, the largest shopping center in Europe, and an extension to Toronto's Royal Ontario Museum.
OTHER NEWS IN BRIEF