Word: nablus
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...from inside the Palestinian territories. Suicide attacks peaked in March 2002, prompting Israel to launch a massive counterterrorism offensive in which Israeli troops set up checkpoints on all major roads, imposed curfews and fought their way into militant strongholds in refugee camps and in the cities of Jenin, Bethlehem, Nablus and Ramallah. Israeli troops stayed on. A security barrier was hastily built, and hundreds of roadblocks were erected. Commando teams carry out search-and-arrest missions nearly every night. Palestinians consider themselves the victims of an occupying army. Israelis retort that statistics prove the validity of their methods: Last year...
...Israelis, the West Bank's main battlefield is Nablus. An ancient city of 134,000 people boxed in by tall hills and scores of Israeli checkpoints, Nablus is dubbed by Israelis the "Capital of Terror." One officer says, "If I gave my men so much as a 15 minute break from their duties, there would be a bomb leaving Nablus on its way to Tel Aviv." No kidding: the IDF says that at the Nablus checkpoints last year, soldiers discovered 31 bombs, four guns and six grenades. And the Israelis claim that they destroyed 14 explosives labs in Nablus alone...
...Nablus battalion headquarters of the IDF, the senior officer has a display case with bottles of champagne and wine, each a gift from his superiors, each tagged with the name of a terrorist captured or killed. The Israelis rely on a web of informers for information. Saleh Abdul Jawad, a political science professor at Birzeit University, says Israel has "tens of thousands" of Palestinian informers on its payroll. Some keep tabs on who prays at mosques, while others burrow into militant cells, planting bugs and betraying planned actions to their controllers. "Every small part of Palestinian life is under Shin...
...guarantee that his Fatah forces can turn the West Bank into a beacon of democracy and prosperity. Israeli intelligence officers say they are worried about the possibility of warfare erupting among Fatah's many, often rival militias. And according to Abdul Sattar Kassem, a political scientist at Nablus' an-Najah National University, West Bankers will turn against Abbas if they see fellow Palestinians suffering in Gaza. "This will bring more support for Hamas in the West Bank. People will take the foreign money, but they will whisper their support for Hamas," Kassem says...
...refugee camp. My colleague, Elizabeth Porter and I were struck by the hospitality and warmth we found in Balata—and appalled at the living conditions there. We were woken every night by explosions caused by the IDF’s incursions into both the Old City of Nablus and Balata. We were frequently greeted by ‘Shalom!’ in the street in Nablus and Balata—maybe a surprise to outsiders who may believe the Palestinian people indoctrinated and hate-filled, but reinforced by the fact that we did not hear a single...