1. On July 31, 2007, Israeli security forces and the IDF detained Hisham Hader Shakr , 25, a Hamas operative from the village of ‘Ein Arik (west of Ramallah). An Israeli Security Agency interrogation revealed that at the beginning of 2005, when he was in Jordan, he, along with Shadi Daba’a, both activists in the Muslim Brotherhood, made plans to attack Israeli tourists in Jordan .
2. After the two had various possible targets under observation, the Raddison SAS hotel in Amman and another hotel nearby were chose. According to the plan, they were supposed to get on the bus taking Israel tourists to their hotels and shoot and kill as many of them as possible . To that aim they acquired two Kalashnikov rifles and practiced shooting them.
3. The plan misfired when Hader Shakr was detained by the Jordanian security forces, which suspected him of belonging to the Muslim Brotherhood and expelled him to the West Bank . There he enlisted in Hamas and headed a group of its operatives.
4. It was not the first time that tourist facilities in Jordan , especially hotels in Amman , were targeted for terrorist attacks. The Raddison SAS was one of the targets in the series of three coordinated suicide bombing attacks which took place on November 9, 2005. The attacks, carried out by Al-Qaeda, killed 67 individuals and wounded 200. 2
The area around the Raddison SAS hotel, one of the targets of the Al-Qaeda attack
of November 9, 2005 (Al-Jazeera TV, November 9, 2005). Hader Shakr, who was detained
by the Israeli security forces, also planned to attack Israeli tourists arriving at the hotel.
1 According to information from the Israeli Security Agency.
2 For further information see our November 10, 2005 Bulletin entitled "In a series of three nearly simultaneous terrorist explosions aimed against hotels in Amman , about 67 individuals were killed and more than 200 wounded (November 9, 2005)” . Hamas spokesman Musheir al-Masri issued a statement condemning the attacks and saying that Hamas opposed such actions and expressing his sympathy for the families (although Hamas had no qualms about carrying out suicide bombing attacks in crowded locations in Israel ).
