Pi Glilot bombing | |
---|---|
Part of the Second Intifada militancy campaign | |
Native name | Hebrew: ניסיון הפיגוע בחוות הדלק והגז פי גלילות |
Location | Tel Aviv, Israel |
Coordinates | 32°08′26″N34°48′16″E / 32.14056°N 34.80444°E |
Date | May 23, 2002 |
Attack type | Bombing attack |
Weapon | Remote controlled explosive weapon |
Perpetrators | Hamas claimed responsibility |
The Pi Glilot bombing was an attempt by a Palestinian terrorist to cause a massive explosion in the Pi Glilot LPG depot north of Tel Aviv, Israel. It occurred on May 23, 2002. The attempt was foiled with no injuries, but if it had succeeded, it could have killed thousands of people in a massive fireball.
On Thursday, May 23, 2002, Israeli truck driver Yitzhak Ginsburg drove a tanker truck into the Pi Glilot gas depot, and pulled up next to eight other parked fuel tankers. As the truck was being filled with diesel, a bomb on the underside of the truck was detonated, causing the truck to rupture and catch fire. Ginsburg was thrown from the vehicle but was not injured. Safety workers at the facility put out the fire using sprinkler systems.
Israeli police stated that the bomb had been placed on the truck by a Palestinian terrorist while the truck was parked overnight in a publicly accessible lot near the facility. He waited for the truck to be refueled, then detonated the bomb using a remote-control device, possibly a mobile phone. According to investigators, the terrorist watched the tanker from a nearby vantage point. [1] [ dead link ] [2]
Israeli officials said that if the plot had succeeded, the fire would have spread to nearby gas tanks stored in the Pi Glilot facility, which held about 3,000 tons of gas and 80 million liters of fuel. This would have sparked a chain reaction, resulting in an explosion that would create a shock wave powerful enough to destroy cars and buildings in the area, and a massive fireball that would have consumed everything within a radius of several kilometers. The results would have been devastating due to the Pi Glilot depot's location. The depot was located in Herzliya, north of the upscale Tel Aviv neighborhood of Ramat Aviv and near the city of Ramat HaSharon. The depot also stood next to the Glilot Junction on Highway 2, one of Israel's busiest traffic arteries. The headquarters of Mossad, Shin Bet, and Israeli Military Intelligence are located at the Glilot Junction. If the truck had been carrying a more volatile fuel than diesel such as gasoline, disaster would have been more likely. [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] Police estimated that the attack would have killed 10,000 people. [2]
Before the attack, several attempts were made to find a suitable place to relocate the Pi Glilot facility away from a densely populated area. These attempts were blocked by local governments who did not want the gas depot to be built in their jurisdictions. [3] [ dead link ]
The Pi Glilot was one of many attacks in May 2002 as part of the Second Intifada. A suicide bomber attacked a crowded city center in Rishon LeZion that same evening of May 23 at 9:30 PM. The attack was one of a series of attempted mega-attacks, designed to cause massive loss of life. Another example of such an attempt was a 2003 plot to attack the Azrieli Towers in Tel Aviv with a 1,000-kilogram bomb, which was foiled by Israeli security services. [3]
After the attack, operations at the Pi Glilot facility were suspended. [1] The government demanded that the facility be shut down within 90 days, but changed its mind and allowed it to remain open until 2004. [6]
This incident occurred two weeks after the end of Operation Defensive Shield, a military operation by the Israel Defense Forces to combat Palestinian terrorist groups, by carrying out raids, such as during the Battle of Jenin and the Siege of the Church of the Nativity, in the West Bank.
In the immediate aftermath, no Palestinian organization claimed responsibility for the attack. [7] Later, in November 2002, the Shin Bet found a Hamas group that was responsible for the Pi Glilot bombing and other attacks. [8] Three members of a Hamas cell in Jerusalem that orchestrated the Pi Glilot attack were given life sentences for other attacks that killed 35 people. [9]
Note: This compilation includes only those attacks that resulted in casualties. Attacks which did not kill or wound are not included.
Yahya Abd-al-Latif Ayyash was the chief bombmaker of Hamas and the leader of the West Bank battalion of the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades. In that capacity, he earned the nickname "the Engineer". Ayyash is credited with advancing the technique of suicide bombings against Israel by Palestinian militant groups. The bombings he orchestrated killed approximately 90 Israelis, many of them civilians. He was assassinated by the Shin Bet on January 5, 1996, through a booby-trapped mobile phone.
On 1 June 2001, a Hamas-affiliated terrorist blew himself up outside the Dolphinarium discotheque on the beachfront in Tel Aviv, Israel, killing 21 Israelis, 16 of whom were teenagers. The majority of the victims were Israeli teenage girls whose families had recently immigrated from the former Soviet Union.
Jewish extremist terrorism is terrorism, including religious terrorism, committed by extremists within Judaism.
The Ramat Gan bus bombing was a Hamas suicide attack on a crowded No. 20 commuter bus in Ramat Gan, Israel on July 24, 1995, near the Israel Diamond Exchange. Six Israelis were killed and 33 were wounded. The bomb contained 15 kilograms of TNT packed with nails into a metal pipe.
The 2004 Ashdod Port bombings were two suicide bombings carried out nearly simultaneously on March 14, 2004 at the Port of Ashdod in Ashdod, Israel. As a result, 10 civilians were killed and 16 were injured. Hamas and Fatah claimed joint responsibility for the attack.
Yaakov Teitel is an American-born Israeli religious nationalist, convicted for killing two people in 2009. Teitel, who had immigrated to Israel in 2000, settling in a West Bank settlement, confessed to planning and committing various acts of terrorism and hate crimes against Palestinians, homosexuals, left-wingers, missionary Christians, and police officers across Israel. Teitel was sentenced to life imprisonment, which he is currently serving.
Events in the year 2002 in Israel.
Events in the year 2003 in the Palestinian territories.
Abdullah Ghaleb Barghouti is a Palestinian leading commander in Hamas' armed wing, the Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades, in the West Bank. He was also one of the organization's chief bomb makers. Barghouti is currently serving 67 life-term sentences in Israeli prison.
The 2012 Tel Aviv bus bombing was a mass-injury terror attack carried out on November 21, 2012, on a crowded passenger bus driving in the center of Tel Aviv's business district. The attack was carried out by an Israeli citizen of Arab descent, who remotely detonated an explosive device, which he had hid on the bus in advance. Twenty-eight civilians were injured in the attack, among them three who were injured seriously. The attack was carried out on the 8th and last day of Operation Pillar of Defense, only a few hours before the ceasefire was reached.
The 2012 Israeli operation in the Gaza Strip was a military operation carried out in the Gaza Strip by the Israel Defense Forces starting on 14 November 2012, following rocket attacks on Israeli territory launched from Gaza during the preceding days.
The Iran–Israel proxy conflict, also known as the Iran–Israel proxy war or Iran–Israel Cold War, is an ongoing proxy conflict between Iran and Israel. In the Israeli–Lebanese conflict, Iran has supported Lebanese Shia militias, most notably Hezbollah. In the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, Iran has backed Palestinian groups such as Hamas. Israel has supported Iranian rebels, such as the People's Mujahedin of Iran, conducted airstrikes against Iranian allies in Syria and assassinated Iranian nuclear scientists. In 2018 Israeli forces directly attacked Iranian forces in Syria.
On 22 December 2013, at approximately 2:30 pm, a pressure cooker bomb exploded on a public bus in Bat Yam, Israel. All casualties were averted because a few minutes earlier, a passenger on the bus had examined the contents of an unattended bag, and saw what looked like a bomb inside, which led all passengers and the driver to exit the vehicle. The bombing shattered or blew out all windows on the bus, and significantly damaged the interior.
Sergeant Almog Shiloni of the Israel Defense Forces was killed on 10 November 2014 after he was stabbed multiple times at Tel Aviv HaHagana Railway Station. He died in hospital from his wounds. Shiloni was off-duty, but in uniform and armed at the time.
An increase of violence occurred in the Israeli–Palestinian conflict starting in the autumn of 2015 and lasting into the first half of 2016. It was called the "Intifada of the Individuals" by Israeli sources, the Knife Intifada, Stabbing Intifada or Jerusalem Intifada by international sources because of the many stabbings in Jerusalem, or Habba by Palestinian sources. 38 Israelis and 235 Palestinians were killed in the violence. 558 Israelis and thousands of Palestinians were injured.
Husam Badran is the former leader of Hamas’s military wing in the northern West Bank. He was the orchestrator of several suicide bombings during the Second Intifada with the highest number of fatalities including the 2001 bombing which resulted in the Dolphinarium discotheque massacre in Tel Aviv which killed 21 people. Currently Badran serves as the international spokesperson for Hamas using Twitter, Facebook, and news media to encourage Hamas militants to commit acts of political violence against Israelis and the Israeli government. He lives in Doha, Qatar.
In a terrorist attack in Tel Aviv, Israel on 8 June 2016, two Palestinian gunmen opened fire on patrons at the Max Brenner Cafe at the Sarona Market, killing four people and injuring seven others. The perpetrators were caught alive by the security forces and put in custody. According to an official indictment filed by the Tel Aviv District Prosecutor's Office the perpetrators were inspired by the Islamic State group.
On 7 April 2022, a mass shooting took place on Dizengoff Street in Tel Aviv, Israel. Three Israeli civilians were killed and six were injured.