A senior Hamas terrorist, involved in planning the 2002 suicide bombing of the Park Hotel in Netanya, was arrested overnight Monday in the West Bank, security officials announced Tuesday.Muhammad Harwish, head of Hamas's armed wing in Tulkarm, was apprehended along with his personal aide, Adnan Samara. The two were being interrogated by security forces.
A Duvdevan special forces unit, along with personnel from the Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) and special Border Police forces, arrested the pair after encountering them during a search for weapons in Tzurif, close to Bethlehem.
Harwish replaced Omar Jabar as the head of Hamas in Tulkarm in 2008 when Jabar was arrested. Prior to his arrest, Harwish was the most wanted terrorist in Tulkarm, and was involved in terrorist attacks, setting up terror cells and purchasing weapons to fight IDF and Palestinian Authority police forces.
According to the Shin Bet, Harouis had been wanted since 2004 for Hamas activity in Tulkarm.
The terrorist was one of the planners of the Passover 2002 hotel bombing that killed 29 people and injured 64 others.
In March 2004, Harouish was wounded by IDF fire and treated in a hospital in Ramallah. From there he continued terror activity against Israel, including a planned suicide attack that was thwarted by Israeli forces.
Later that year, Harouish was arrested in Ramallah by PA security forces and jailed in Jericho. He was released in 2006 and returned to Tulkarm, where he joined Gabbar in developing the Hamas infrastructure there.
Samara, captured alongside Harouish, had been released one year ago from an Israeli prison, where he was held for his involvement in establishing terror cells with Harouish in 2007.
Security officials also announced Tuesday that in July and August, the Shin Bet and IDF had arrested five Fatah-Tanzim operatives in the village of Silwad near Ramallah, including an active member of PA security forces and a Palestinian who lived in the US.
The group were involved in a number of shooting attacks near Route 60, which passes near the village, said the army.
Tanzim is the armed faction of Fatah, the ruling party in the PA government.
At 6 a.m. on July 9, a number of shots were fired at an Israeli car driving toward the Jewish settlement of Psagot. That night, IDF troops arrested two residents of Silwad, Maharan Iad and Salah Hamad, who had been in Israeli prisons in the past for terrorist activity.
During interrogation by the Shin Bet, the two confessed to planning the shooting attack, together with associate Mustafa Hamad, another Fatah member who was arrested later, security officials said.
Iad, who was in Israeli prisons twice before and lived in the US from 2006 until May 2009, confessed to planning the attack together with the other two over several days, during which they searched for a vantage point to shoot from, said the officials.
Rami Hamad, the last of the five to be arrested, was allegedly serving as a member of PA security forces as well as the Tanzim terror group at the time of his arrest. Hamad confessed to involvement in four separate shooting attacks.