'Hamas squad' in occupied West Bank arrested by Israel for 'plotting attacks'

Israel's Shin Bet said Wednesday it had arrested three Palestinians accused of being part of a "Hamas terrorist infrastructure" plotting bomb attacks on Israeli targets in the occupied West Bank.

The shadowy security agency said in a statement that a joint operation with army and police led to the arrest last month of Omar Eid, 24, a resident of the occupied West Bank village of Deir Jirir.

Also arrested at the time were Ahmed Sajidiyya, 27, of the Qalandia Palestinian refugee camp and Muhammad Hamad, 26, from nearby Kufr Aqab, both located in Israeli-annexed east Jerusalem.

Shin Bet said the men planned to make a bomb from plans downloaded from the internet and bought chemicals, nails and other metallic objects for that purpose.

They were arrested "before being able to assemble the explosive device," it added.

The statement said the three first met at Birzeit University, near Ramallah, where they also came into contact with Abd al-Rahman Hamdan, "a senior activist" for the Islamist militant group Hamas on the campus, who funded their activities with tens of thousands of shekels (thousands of dollars/euros).

The statement also accused the men of past "attempts to carry out bomb attacks" against Israeli soldiers and said they were planning future missions with remotely-detonated bombs against Israeli traffic and army posts in the Ramallah area.

They had even weighed bombing a Jerusalem football stadium during a game but a reconnaissance visit by Eid left him daunted by the high security and the idea was dropped, it said.

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