(Update of The Israeli army foils another attempt to disrupt the current lull in the fighting)

On two occasions recently, Israeli army (IDF) soldiers at the Hawara checkpoint near Nablus caught teenage boys with hidden weapons . In the first incident, which took place on May 22, 2005, a 15-year old boy was caught with two pipe charges attached to his belt. In the second, which occurred two days later, a 14-year old boy was caught trying to smuggle two explosive charges through the checkpoint.

Both incidents were severely condemned by terrorist organization activists in Nablus and by Nablus residents. At the same time they attempted to lay the blame on Israel for sending the boys out. Conspicuously, most of the accusations came from senior operatives belonging to Fatah / Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades , the organization whose Nablus members were behind many instances of dispatching teenagers on terrorist missions.

MSNBC's correspondent Martin Fletcher interviewed the parents of Muhammad [Mustafa al-Nadi], the 15-year old boy stopped by IDF soldiers at the Hawara checkpoint. His parents expressed their great anger at Fatah / Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades , calling its operatives criminals and saying that Allah would punish them ( MSNBC , May 27, 2005). The correspondent spoke with the boy and read him a letter from his mother asking him to confess and to give Israel all the information in his possession about the men who had sent him. Afterwards the boy admitted that after Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades had approached him five times he finally agreed to cooperate with them. The correspondent also visited Muhammad's school and interviewed his classmates, who expressed great anger at Fatah / Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades , because, they said, “we [now] have quiet and there [was] no reason to send Muhammad out and to ruin everything.”

The following is a selection of reactions posted on the Palestine Net Internet site on May 26 and 28, 2005).

• ‘ Alaa' Sanakreh, a senior Fatah / Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades member in Nablus denied any connection and responsibility for the two boys who were stopped at Hawara, or the young man who was stopped on May 27 at Beit Eba at the western exit from Nablus. ¹ He claimed that Israeli Intelligence was involved in sending the boys because it wanted to interfere with the Palestinian struggle. He added that the men who tempted the boys were known to Fatah and that the Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades would follow and kill them.

• Muhammad Ghazal, a senior of Hamas' activist said that children were not to be involved in such actions because it was children who would build the future. He claimed that Israel was responsible for the “urge” prompting some children to take part in that sort of action.

• Nasser Juma'ah, a senior member of Fatah / Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades in Nablus claimed that Israel was trying to tarnish the image of the “resistance.” “The natural place” for children, he stated, was school.

• Faadi Qafisha, a senior member of Fatah / Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades in Nablus claimed that his organization never used children. He stated that Fatah / Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades sent only post-adolescents on military missions and only after they had been investigated.

• Nasser al-Khatib (Abu ‘Aziz), a senior member of Fatah / Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades in Nablus claimed that his organization had begun an investigation of the incidents with children because they were a very serious matter. He promised to deliver “crushing blows” to whoever was behind the actions, Israeli or Palestinian. (In an interview with an MSNBC reporter, Nasser Abu ‘Aziz stated that he would never send a teenager to his death and raised the possibility that Israel had sent him.) ²

• Ramadam ‘Adassi , a senior member of Fatah / Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades in the Askar refugee camp near Nablus ³ denied sending children on that kind of mission and claimed that Israel was lying. He also claimed that “the actions of individuals.”

• Ghassan al-Shaka'a, former mayor of Nablus and a member of the PLO's executive committee called for those who sent children to the checkpoints to be brought to trial. He called upon parents to take care of their children and noted that “it wasn't a struggle for independence.”

• The mother of the boy stopped at the Hawara checkpoint who had explosives in his possession said, “Allah will not forgive the one who deceived my son.” The boy's father asked, “Why don't they send my brother, my mother or my neighbor instead of my son? Why did they do it? What sin did my poor son commit to make them deceive him?”

• In a survey conducted in the streets of Nablus by Palestine Net, residents of the city agreed that to involve children in that sort of action was despicable. They said that Allah was not pleased those who make children party to such things and that the people who had sent the boys were suspect.

² Nasser al-Khatib (Abu ‘Aziz) also stated that Fatah / Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades activists in the Balata refugee camp were exempt from the lull in the fighting because of Israeli killings ( Palestine Net , April 22, 2005).

³ Muhammad Mustafa al-Nadi, the 15-year old boy arrested at the Hawara checkpoint lives in the Askar refugee camp.