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CNN Sunday Morning

Week in Jerusalem off to Deadly Start

Aired January 27, 2002 - 11:15   ET

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

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: Now on to the Middle East now, where the work week got off to a deadly start in West Jerusalem. At least one Israeli was killed and more than 110 others hurt in a Palestinian suicide bombing. CNN's Jerrold Kessel reports.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JERROLD KESSEL, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It has become a familiar scene on Israeli streets, an all too familiar a scene for Israelis. In the heart of downtown West Jerusalem, a Palestinian suicide bomber wreaked mayhem.

Rescue services speedily on the scene ferrying the wounded to hospitals, explosive experts searching for further bombs, police anxious there might be a shooting accomplice, as there was in a similar attack in Tel Aviv 48 hours earlier.

"This is the seventh explosion I have witnessed in this area. The most powerful," said one eyewitness who works in a nearby restaurant.

This latest deadly bombing fits into a pattern of the ongoing tactical tit-for-tat attacks, which have brought so much death and destruction.

(on camera): But there's a sense that this conflict is now moving onto the plane of a decisive strategic battle, especially at a time when there has been a major political shift in the United States.

(voice-over): The news of the latest attack reached the Israeli government as it convened in its weekly meeting. Israel is delighted by the way the Bush administration has begun to turn the political screws on Yasser Arafat, whom Israeli tanks have kept locked up in his West Bank headquarters for the past two months.

The Palestinian Authority swiftly condemned the attack, but it's not only Israel. The United States is now piling the pressure on Mr. Ararat to battle terrorism.

CHEMI SHALEV, POLITICAL ANALYST: There is a possibility that those who claim that Arafat should be pressured are right, and that he will now respond in the fight against terrorism. There is the possibility that they are wrong, and that he is like a wounded animal now in a corner. And just like the intifada itself broke out a year ago when Arafat was surrounded and condemned by America and by the European community, there is a concern that the same thing will happen now, and he will feel that he doesn't have anything left to lose. And that he will, instead of deciding to fight terrorism, he will decide to unleash it against the Israelis in the hopes of mixing things up and perhaps improving his position.

KESSEL: Yasser Arafat is striking a defiant posture. On Saturday, he said he would never be subdued by the Israeli tanks, and that the march of Palestinian martyrs towards Jerusalem would continue. Again on Sunday, the beleaguered Palestinian leader received more supporters, backing him in his stand. The same message delivered on the streets of Gaza by people from all Palestinian factions.

But this latest attack in the wake of the new tough U.S. position suggests this is a situation headed for show down. Yasser Arafat battling for survival; Ariel Sharon battling to make sure the Palestinian leader has no way out of his increasing physical and diplomatic isolation.

Jerrold Kessel, CNN, Jerusalem.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

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