Israel’s Shin Bet security agency on Sunday announced that it has recently arrested an Islamic Jihad cell composed of six Palestinians from Bethlehem and claimed that they were plotting to assassinate the Israeli war minister Avigdor Lieberman.
According to a statement released by the agency the six Palestinians were planning to place a bomb on a West Bank road near Gush Etzion settlement on which Lieberman’s convoy was to travel.
The statement noted that the cell had planned to carry out other operations without giving details. No response from the Islamic Jihad Movement has been issued yet to the Shin Bet accusation.
The Shin Bet also claimed foiling a plot by another Islamic Jihad armed cell operating in Bethlehem to launch shooting attacks against Israeli soldiers and settlers.
Lieberman was the target of a similar plot in 2014 when a Hamas cell planned to hit the vehicle in which he was traveling with an RPG.
The Shin Bet said that the Islamic Jihad cell members were aware of past failed attempts to kill Lieberman and therefore believed that if they planted an explosive device on the Israeli minister’s travel route they would be more successful.
Based on the Shin Bet allegations the cell’s location had been identified and its plan thwarted at a very early stage of its work.
