Captured terrorist infiltrator was eight-year-old Palestinian boy

Thursday January 16, 2003 13:54

by Mon Cynulliad

Two Palestinians armed with knives infiltrated into the central Gaza Strip settlement of Netzarim Saturday night and tried to stab a local resident. The settlement's rabbi discovered one of the infiltrators in his home and fired at him. One of the intruders told residents he was a worker from Thailand. Security forces arrived on the scene and were amazed to discover the suspected terrorists were youths aged eight and 13.

At least one of the child infiltrators was on drugs, Army Radio reported. The radio quoted OC Gaza Brig.-Gen. Yisrael Ziv, who added that the boys "aren't able to answer the most basic questions... It is inconceivable that they acted alone." Ziv accused terrorist groups of making "cynicial use of children" to attack Israel.

The boys were captured by the army and admitted to Beer Sheva's Soroka Hospital, one with a bullet wound and the other with a hip fracture. There were no Israeli casualties in the incident.

Military sources said the Palestinian boys probably belonged to a youth group that encouraged its members to undertake "dare missions" as a test for acceptance into one of the terrorist organizations or even sacrifice their lives for the Palestinian cause. Last week three 15-year-old Palestinian teenagers were shot dead when they tried to infiltrate into Alei Sinai in the northern Gaza Strip.

The two Palestinian boys made their way into Netzarim shortly after 7 p.m. Saturday night through the settlement's main gate, undetected by a security guard. They came across a twelve-year-old boy from the community and tried to stab him.

"My son had just left the house when we heard a scream," the boy's father related. "My wife ran outside and saw the two Palestinians struggling with him, beating him."

The boy's mother threw stones at the attackers and the boy managed to escape and hide. "I took my gun and started to chase them," the father said. "I fired and injured one of them."

The thirteen-year-old boy made his way into the home of Netzarim's rabbi, Zion Tawil. "We had guests in the house and heard shouts and gunfire outside," Tawil told Army Radio. "There was a knock on the door, and I shouted, 'Who is it?' but no one answered. We turned off the lights and I took out my M-16 rifle and began to check out the house. All of a sudden I came across him. He was standing about four meters away from me, between the pantry and the kitchen. I fired a number of shots, but didn't hit him and then he ran out of the house."

After fleeing from the rabbi, the boy arrived at the home of Shlomo Kostinger. The boy shouted at Kostinger in accented Hebrew, "Thai, Thai," apparently trying to convince him that he was a foreign worker from Thailand.

"We let him into the house because he was very confused," said Saraleh Kostinger. "We gave him water to drink and brought him into the security room. He continued to mumble hysterically, so we gave him a Book of Psalms." The Kostingers waited in the security room with their six children and the frightened young terrorist.

"My husband went outside and realized that security forces were searching for another intruder," Saraleh told Maariv. "He told the soldiers that we had someone in our house, apparently a Thai worker."

The soldiers entered the Kostingers' house to check on the stranger and discovered that he was the missing infiltrator. He was then evacuated to the Beer Sheva hospital for medical attention.