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Tue, Aug 31, 2010 | Debka.com

Israeli policemen gather at the site of the shooting attack near the Jewish settlement of Kiryat Arbah, Tuesday, Aug, 31, 2010. A Palestinian gunman opened fire on an Israeli vehicle traveling in the West Bank on Tuesday, killing four passengers, authorities said, in a deadly attack that cast a long shadow over Mideast peace talks set to start this week. (AP Photo/Sebastian Scheiner)

Hamas gunmen murder four Israelis in ambush near Hebron

Hamas gunmen killed four Israeli civilians – all residents of Bet Haggai – in their car at the Beni Naim junction near Kiryat Arba Tuesday night, Aug. 31. The shooting attack in the West Bank believed to have been aimed at torpedoing the Israeli-Palestinian peace talks, set to kick off on Wednesday in Washington.

They are identified as Yitzhak (47) and Tali (45) Ames, Kochava Ben-Haim (37) and Avishai Schindler (24). Tali Ames was pregnant. The Ames couple had six children, including a one-and-a-half-year-old toddler. The gunmen fired a hail of automatic fire from a following car, then approached the bullet-riddled vehicle and fired again at point-blank range to make sure their victims were dead.

“When we arrived on the scene, all four doors of the car were open and four bodies were strewn on the road,” Magen David Adom paramedic Guy Ronen told The Jerusalem Post. “We saw that the vital organs had been struck by a very large number of bullets, and that there was no chance of saving their lives,” he added. “It was a very difficult scene. We had learned to forget scenes like this in recent years,” Ronen said. [Jerusalem Post; Tue, Aug 31, 2010]

Debkafile’s counter-terror sources report: The IDF and security authorities failed to anticipate this attack on a West Bank highway although Hamas had threatened to unleash terrorist attacks against Israel to sabotage the Israel-Palestinian talks about to start in Washington this week. This was reported by debkafile last Wednesday.

Tuesday night, Hamas took responsibility for the murderous ambush and warned it was just the beginning and worse was still to come.

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, who received the news two hours before he landed in the US capital to join the summit with President Barak Obama and Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas, ordered the defense minister and chief and staff to hunt the killers and their masters down and punish them without regard to diplomatic considerations. He refrained from ordering them to target Hamas command centers in Damascus and Gaza from which the attack was planned.

In a special message, Netanyahu said he “strengthened the hands of our brothers and sisters in Judea and Samaria.”
Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu … said upon landing that he would speak in the evening with US Secretary of State Hilary Clinton and tell her that this “criminal attack” proves again the need for Israel to stand steadfastly by its security demands. [Jerusalem Post; Tue, Aug 31, 2010]

West Bank Jewish leaders announced the resumption of building Wednesday Sept. 1 and an end to the government construction freeze due to expire on Sept. 26.

Chief of Staff Lt.-Gen. Gaby Ashkenazi visited the scene of the attack as the hunt for the perpetrators got underway in the Hebron vicinity.

Hamas military wing spokesman Abu Obeida told The Associated Press late Tuesday that Hamas carried out the attack.

Hamas supporters celebrate the shooting attack in the West Bank, in Jabalya refugee camp in the northern Gaza Strip, August 31, 2010. (Photo: REUTERS/Mohammed Salem)