By DPA
Tel Aviv : Israel Tuesday raised a nationwide alert to the second highest level with police deployed throughout the country, after the first Palestinian suicide bombing in a year, Israel Radio reported.
A 73-year-old Israeli woman was killed when a suicide bomber blew himself up in a semi-enclosed shopping mall in the southern town of Dimona. Israeli police later shot dead a second suicide bomber lying among the injured as he tried to reach for his detonator.
Different Palestinian militant factions claimed responsibility for the attack.
Israel’s Channel 10 television noted that the videos of the two attackers by one group, the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, did not match the face and posture of one of the attackers filmed at the scene from close up – sparking fears more bombers may have crossed into Israel, possibly via Gaza’s breached border with Israel.
“There are no pinpoint (intelligence) warnings, but in all the number of warnings has grown and we think that following the attack that happened in Dimona, there may be an attempt to carry out more,” Superintendent Berti Ohayon, the head of the Israel Police Operational Branch, told Israel Radio.
He said roadblocks were set up at city entrances and forces in larger number were patrolling along Israel’s borders. Reinforced patrols were also deployed in Israel’s coastal plain, Jerusalem and Tel Aviv.
Israel submitted a letter protesting the bombing to the United Nations, saying that it reserves the right to respond, Israel Radio said.