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American Morning

Settler Couple Killed in West Bank

Aired August 05, 2002 - 07:01   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: We begin, of course, in the Mideast, where weekend terrorist attacks left more than a dozen people dead.
Our Jerrold Kessel is in Jerusalem on this day after the violence.

Jerrold -- hello.

JERROLD KESSEL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hello, Daryn -- good morning to you.

Not a good morning yesterday, not a good day yesterday, and plenty of bloodshed, and that only intensified during the night with more Palestinian attacks, and more Israeli measures to try to counter this latest wave of Palestinian bombings, and some tough measures being applied by the Israelis in the West Bank.

But in the West Bank last night, another Israeli couple, a Jewish settler couple, was shot and killed in an ambush as they were making their way home north of the town of Ramallah to their settlement home. They were killed in the ambush. Their two, small children in the car with them, one aged 3, another 8 months, were wounded in that attack. The woman was also pregnant.

That attack, the responsibility claimed for it by the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, the group affiliated to Yasser Arafat's mainstream Fatah movement.

And as Israelis continue to bury their dead from yesterday's attack, some of those were buried yesterday, other funerals being held today. Most of the dead came in that attack, for which responsibility was claimed by Hamas, the militant Islamic group, the attack on the bus in Galilee, as a commuter bus yesterday heading from Haifa to Safed to Galilee. And nine people were killed in that attack by a Hamas suicide bomber, three of them identified as Israeli soldiers, and among the other six, an Israeli-Arab woman and also two Philippine women who were working in Israel.

And the Israelis countering with attacks against that by imposing travel restrictions in the West Bank, also demolishing the Palestinian homes of other suicide bombers and attackers, and continuing their strong attacks in Palestinian towns, mainly in Nablus, to try to find the Hamas infrastructure there.

We understand one latest report that a Hamas -- a top Hamas man in the northern part of the West Bank has been apprehended this morning. He may have been the one who dispatched yesterday's suicide bomber, so say Israeli authorities -- Daryn.

KAGAN: Jerrold Kessel, thank you for the latest from the Middle East.

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