The ISA (Israel Security Agency – Shin Bet) on Tuesday, 12 Teves 5773 lifted a gag order on the arrest of members of a Ramallah area terror cell during the past two months. The cell is affiliated with the PFLP (Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine) terror organization, and the suspects in custody were operating in the Binyamin Regional Council region of Shomron. The cell planned terror attacks as well as the abduction of Israelis to obtain the release of PFLP leader Ahmed Sa’adat, who is imprisoned in Israel.

In the past, demands for the release of Sa’adat were met with Israeli refusal, as the master terrorist planned the assassination of Tourism Minister Rechavam Ze’evi HY”D.

Ze’evi, a retired IDF major-general, was assassinated by a lone gunman in the Jerusalem Hyatt Hotel on October 17, 2001. The late minister was also a noted historian and the founder of the Moledet Party. In December 2008, an IDF court sentenced Sa’adat to a 30-year prison term.

(YWN – Israel Desk, Jerusalem)