Military

DATE=07/01/02

TYPE=CORRESPONDENT REPORT

TITLE=ISRAEL / PALESTINIANS (L)

NUMBER=2-291600

BYLINE=ROSS DUNN

DATELINE=JERUSALEM

CONTENT=

VOICED

INTRO: Israel says it has killed a man it describes as a master bomb maker for the militant Islamic group Hamas. Hamas has vowed to avenge the death of their activist, Muhanad Taher, a man Israel says is responsible for the murder of more than 100 people in suicide bombings. Ross Dunn reports from Jerusalem.

TEXT: Israeli Defense Minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer says that the killing of Muhanad Taher is the most important military operation in the last two months and a most "significant achievement".

Mr. Taher, 26, and one of his lieutenants were killed by an elite Israeli commando unit during a raid into the West Bank city of Nablus on Sunday.

Hamas claims he was assassinated and says the killing will only fuel the organization's determination to continue what it says is a "holy war" against Israel.

Israel denies the claim saying that Mr. Taher was killed in an exchange of gunfire after he refused to surrender.

Mr. Ben-Eliezer congratulated the soldiers who took part in the operation, describing Mr. Taher, as the "head of the military infrastructure of Hamas", and a "killer and planner" who "caused more than 100 Israelis to be murdered."

He says there was no "terror attack in the last three months " in which Mr. Taher's "did not play a part".

The Israeli defense minister says that there were others within Hamas already preparing to take his place but Mr. Taher had been the most dangerous bomb-maker within the organization.

In Mr. Ben-Eliezer's words, he was in a "class of his own."

Mr. Taher's killing came as Israel began construction of new electronic security fence around Jerusalem that will eventually stretch 50 kilometers.

The fence is designed to protect the city against Palestinian attacks from the West Bank.

In a separate development, Israel peacefully removed 11 unauthorized Jewish outposts in the West Bank.

Mr. Ben-Eliezer says that more are to dismantled in the coming days. (Signed)

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