Israeli jail attack sparks Palestinian uprising

Six Palestinian prisoners, including a militant accused of the murder of an Israeli government minister in 2001, surrendered on Mar. 14 after a nine-hour armed siege that began when British monitors abandoned the jail where the men were being held. The siege had triggered a wave of protest attacks and abductions directed against foreigners across Gaza and the West Bank and there were heavy exchanges of fire outside the Jericho jail which claimed the lives of two Palestinians. Militants stoned and set fire to the British Council building in Gaza as foreigners began to flee to avoid further reprisals. The prisoners, among them Ahmed Saadat, leader of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, the faction behind the murder of Israel's Tourism minister Rehavam Ze'evi, walked out of the jail shortly after nightfall after a day of high tension in which Israeli forces used repeated artillery and machine-gun fire to reinforce their threat to kill the men if they failed to turn themselves in. During the day, Palestinian gunmen seized a number of foreigners from hotels in Gaza. Palestinian security officials said they included a Swiss Red Cross worker, two Australian teachers, two French medical workers and three journalists–two French and a South Korean. The Australian teachers were subsequently released. Gunmen in Jenin in the West Bank kidnapped Douglas Johnson, a professor of English at the American University, and initially threatened to kill him if Israel harmed Ahmed Saadat. Johnson, who was later released, said he sympathized with Palestinian anger over the Israeli operation in Jericho. The British government insisted it had repeatedly–and fruitlessly–raised with the Palestinian Authority violations of the 2002 agreement under which Saadat and other prisoners were held under international supervision. British Foreign Minister Jack Straw published a joint letter sent by the US and UK consul generals to President Abbas on Mar. 8 in which they warned that the security monitors would be withdrawn unless their safety was protected. The Israeli Army had earlier raked the prison with gunfire after cordoning off the area. It used bulldozers to start destroying the outer walls before firing tank shells and at least one air-launched missile in a show of military strength. A plume of grey smoke rose from the vicinity of the prison in the central Palestinian Authority building in Jericho and the sound of heavy artillery could be heard at intervals before the prisoners and other Palestinian personnel left, hands raised above their heads. The bulk of employees, guards and other prisoners, totaling 182, had left much earlier in the hours after the army operation began, most stripped to their underwear on the orders of Israeli troops. Israeli military sources said 26 Palestinians had been injured during exchanges of fire with those inside the jail.