Quick Takes: News From Israel You May Have Missed

With the country on high alert for possible attacks during Purim, Israeli Defense Force soldiers arrested two Palestinians outside Nablus attempting to smuggle an explosive device, reportedly to carry out a large-scale bombing at holiday festivities in an Israeli city.

In a WorldNetDaily interview, a leader of the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, the declared military wing of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas’s Fatah party, took credit for the foiled attack, referring to Jews as “descendants of monkeys” and the “dirtiest part” of humanity. The terror leader vowed to attempt another terror attack against Purim celebrations.

“We wanted to blow up the holiday of the Israelis. In the Koran the Jews are described like those who bring immorality and corruption to humanity. The Jews are the dirtiest part of the unbelievers. They are the children of the monkeys. No mercy for those who have no mercy,” said Abu Mujaheed, Al Aqsa leader in the “old city” section of Nablus in the West Bank.

Abu Mujaheed claimed Purim was about “practicing prostitution under the pretexts of masks, being naked in the streets and then saying that this is a holiday. It is illogical. Does God accept these aberrations?”

Asked if the Al Aqsa Brigades would temper its attacks during Purim due to the group’s proclaimed religious sensibilities, Abu Mujaheed responded, “In holidays our motivation is bigger. We do not want the Israelis to know what happiness is.”

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There have been some indications that elite Iranian soldiers infiltrated Israel and established dormant cells in the West Bank to be activated by Iran at a later date, security officials said.

Israeli and Palestinian security services have searched in the West Bank for the soldiers, who are thought to be members of the Al-Quds Forces, the extraterritorial operations unit of Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guards, the officials said.

The Iranian agents may have infiltrated as long as three years ago with instructions to set up inactive cells in the West Bank that would become operational later, said the officials, adding they do not suspect the agents are regularly involved in current terror activity or in channeling Iranian funds to Palestinian terror groups.

“Their purpose would be to create an infrastructure for the day they are called to act against Israel,” said a senior security official.

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Congress last week was presented with a new study that documents how the Palestinians have inflated their population numbers by over 50 percent, and that almost $3 billion in United States taxpayer funds may have been provided as aid to the Palestinians based in part on fraudulent data.

“American tax dollars and other international humanitarian aid have been based on inflated population numbers which have been accepted without question by governments and aid agencies. Our researchers pointed out that money has been spent to help Palestinians who were double-counted, never born or not present in the West Bank and Gaza,” said Bennet Zimmerman, head of the new study, title “Arab Population in the West Bank and Gaza.”

Zimmerman led a team of researchers who found Palestinians have inflated their population by close to 1.5 million, in some cases counting people in some cities twice. He was invited to testify at a House International Relations Subcommittee on the Middle East chaired by Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Fla.), probing U.S. assistance to the Palestinian Authority.

American aid to the PA and Palestinian-related agencies, especially to so-called refugee organizations, is devised largely based on Palestinian population figures, a State Department spokesperson said.

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The Palestinians have a new, improved rocket to fire at Israel named after the Iranian Shahab missile and dedicated to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad “because of his courageous position toward the enemy,” a leader of the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades terror group said in an exclusive interview.

“I can say it is true that the inspiration concerning the name [of our new Shahab rocket] was taken from the Iranian rocket that is so terrifying to the enemy. On this occasion I can say that we have the honor to dedicate these new and more sophisticated rockets to the Iranian president because of his courageous position toward the enemy,” said Abu Ahmed, a Gaza-based leader of the Brigades involved in coordinating the group’s rocket network.

Ahmed declined to describe the makeup of his group’s claimed new rockets. “I can only tell you they are more improved in distance and in the rocket fuel, and we call them Shahab-1, Shahab-2 and Shahab-3. They will hit the enemy target much harder,” said Ahmed.

Iranian Shahabs are a series of missiles constructed in part with Russian and Chinese technology. The Shahab-6 reportedly has a range of up to 5,600 kilometers and is capable of reaching Europe from Iran. Iranian officials have claimed to possess Shahab missiles that can reach the eastern seaboard of the Unites States.

A senior IDF official suggested the group likely only changed the name of its already existing Kassam rockets.

Asked if the Al Aqsa Brigades received any Iranian assistance in building its claimed Shahab rockets, Ahmed replied, “We will not give the Israelis any hint about our activities. Let them work hard and investigate about the significance of the name Shahab. I will just say we welcome any help from any anti-Zionist element.”