On November 11, PIJ leader Abdallah Ramadan Shalah granted a long interview to Al-Manar TV, Hezbollah's television channel. During the interview, for the first time he admitted that Israel 's security fence was an important obstacle to the terrorist organizations (the “resistance”).

He noted that the suicide bombing attacks ( istishhad ) were the Palestinian people's “strategic choice,” and were meant to “create a balance of force and deterrence” in the campaign against a superior enemy. Ramadan Shalah noted that the terrorist organizations had every intention of continuing suicide bombing attacks , but that their timing and the possibility of implementing them from the West Bank depended on other factors. “For example,” he said, “there is the separation fence , which is an obstacle to the resistance, and if it were not there the situation would be entirely different .”

The last few years have witnessed a constant decrease in the number of suicide bombing attacks. It results from a number of factors, including the (partial) construction of the security fence, which hinders attempts made by the terrorist organizations to infiltrate suicide bombers into Israel , although they continue to search for the fence's weak spots. ¹

During the past few years the PIJ, supported and encouraged by Syria and Iran , is the Palestinian terrorist organization which has carried out the greatest number of suicide bombing attacks. In 2005 (during the so-called “lull in the fighting”) the organization carried out five lethal suicide bombing attacks within Israel, and two more in 2006. ² Partially completing the fence and the IDF's successful counterterrorist activities in Samaria (a focus for the terrorist organization's infrastructure) indeed hinder (although do not completely prevent) the carrying out of suicide bombing attacks . Such attacks, as stated by Ramadan Shalah, are the modus operandi preferred by the PIJ and the senior leaders of the organization, who have recently expressed their intention to continue using them to attack Israel .

¹ For statistical data and an analysis of the suicide bombing attacks in 2005, see the January 2006 Bulletin, “Palestinian Terrorism in 2005,” at http://www.terrorism-info.org.il/malam_multimedia/English/eng_n/pdf/palestinian_terror_e.pdf .

² The last PIJ suicide bombing attack was carried out at the old Central Bus Station in Tel Aviv on April 17, 2006. For further information see our Bulletin entitled “Palestinian Islamic Jihad suicide bombing attack at the old Central Bus Station in Tel Aviv,” at http://www.terrorism-info.org.il/malam_multimedia/English/eng_n/html/pij_e180406.htm and http://www.terrorism-info.org.il/malam_multimedia/English/eng_n/pdf/pij_e180406.pdf .