IDF soldiers arrested for bomb-making operation

Police say two soldiers ran operation out of Sderot apartment, supplied explosives to organized crime figures in South.

By BEN HARTMAN
Tel Aviv explosion 370 (photo credit: Channel 10)
Tel Aviv explosion 370
(photo credit: Channel 10)
Two IDF soldiers were arrested this week for running a bomb-making operation out of a Sderot apartment building and supplying explosives to organized crime figures in the South, police announced on Thursday.
According to Lachish sub-district police, the soldiers, aged 20 and 21, were arrested after they sold four bombs to an undercover officer, who had been deployed as part of a months-long undercover operation. The explosives were pipe bombs with magnets on them, so they could be affixed to a car and detonated, police said, adding that all four were ready for use.
Police said the soldiers had been running the operation out of a storage shed next to a residential building in the city, and that in recent months at least two bombs they had made had been used in attempted mob hits that left innocent bystanders wounded.
On Thursday, bomb squad officers evacuated the building as they cleared out the storage shed. In the process, they found more supplies allegedly intended for use in bombs.
Lachish commander Yoram Sofer said “the fact that soldiers ran a bomb-making lab in a building where innocent citizens lived in order to use them in criminal acts shows a disregard for human life that should make all of us lose sleep.”
On Thursday, the Ashkelon Magistrate’s Court extended the remand of both suspects by five days, pending an indictment.
On Tuesday, police arrested 15 people in Jaffa as part of a gun-and-explosives investigation.
During the investigation, a police informant recorded himself purchasing five explosive devices from one of the suspects, who sold the bombs for between NIS 3,000 and NIS 15,000 each.