2 terrorists trying to plant bombs killed in gunfight along Gaza border

No casualties; earlier, 2 Islamic Jihad terrorists carrying explosives killed in gunfight near border.

By JERUSALEM POST STAFF
Published: MAY 22, 2009 08:24
IDF gaza wait 248.88 (photo credit: AP [file])
IDF gaza wait 248.88
(photo credit: AP [file])
Mere hours after two Palestinian gunmen were killed in a firefight with IDF soldiers on the Gaza border, troops narrowly avoided a blast on Friday when a bomb went off near a jeep on patrol in the area. Nobody was wounded in the attack, for which responsibility was claimed by the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine. In the incident earlier in the morning, a group of soldiers from the Desert Reconnaissance Battalion identified suspicious men approaching the Kerem Shalom border crossing at the southeastern end of the Gaza Strip. Led by their company commander, the troops crossed the border and attacked the men. Weapons and explosive devices were discovered on their bodies. No soldiers were wounded in the incident. According to the IDF, the gunmen intended to plant bombs along the border fence to be detonated when Israeli patrols passed by. Palestinian medics retrieved the bodies of the two men, who were in military uniform, according to Dr. Moaiya Hassanain of the Gaza Health Ministry. He gave their ages as 22 and 28. According to the Associated Press, they were from the Islamic Jihad. Humanitarian aid flows into the territory through the Kerem Shalom crossing.