 JERUSALEM - Mohammed Deif, the Hamas militant who has been number one on Israels most-wanted list for a decade, appeared on TV early Monday in a documentary prepared by the Al-Jazeera satellite network. | Getting his biography ready for the obit? |
Deif has been targeted several times in Israeli assassination attempts and has been reported seriously wounded, but the man identified as Deif by the TV network showed no effects of wounds. He kept his face hidden during the interview and as he was filmed walking next to the reporter. He was dressed in khaki pants and a checked shirt, a red and white keffiyeh Arab-style headdress covering his face. It was a rare appearance for Deif, who is usually underground avoiding the Israelis, who accuse him of responsibility for many suicide bombing attacks in Israel over the past decade.
The militant, known as a master bombmaker, called for the Arab world to push for an Israeli pullout from the West Bank. Its our duty and role, not only us in Palestine, but every Muslim in the world has a religious duty and role to fight to liberate this land, because its Islamic territory, he said. Deif recounted the Hamas struggle against Israel, chronicling suicide bombings, attacks against Jewish settlements in Gaza before Israels pullout last summer and arms-smuggling tunnels dug under the Gaza-Egypt border. The hourlong program included a visit to one of the tunnels, reporting that they are 300-400 meters (yards) long and take four months to dig. 
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