A private car was set on fire and an Egged passenger bus was sprayed with bullets from ambush near Jerusalem on Sunday night, but the occupants of both vehicles escaped injury.
The terrorist attacks occurred northwest of the capital, on a heavily traveled road used as an alternate to the Jerusalem-Tel Aviv main highway.
They were the latest reminder that the intifada continues, as rival Arab factions battled in Nablus in an ongoing struggle for control of the 3-year-old Palestinian uprising.
A car driven by Israeli police officer Avi Avital was returning from Jerusalem when it was hit by two gasoline bombs at about 9 p.m. local time Sunday, as it was about to enter Givon Hadasha in the West Bank.
Although the front of the car burst into flames, Avital, his wife and their two children, ages 7 and 11, escaped unscathed.
Only a few minutes later, about 20 shots were fired at the Egged bus, which was traveling on the same road from Givat Ze’ev to Jerusalem. Four bullets struck the lower part of the vehicle, but no one on board was hurt.
Meanwhile, Israeli troops were sent into the Nablus casbah Sunday to restore order, after three hours of rioting between Al Fatah activists and followers of the Moslem fundamentalist Hamas movement.
The melee was touched off by Hamas gunmen, who shot a local Fatah man, Omar Masrouji, at close range.
The seriously wounded Masrouji was rushed to the Anglican Hospital. He was undergoing emergency surgery when a Hamas gang burst into the operating room and stabbed him.
Fistfights broke out in the, casbah and “quickly escalated. Combatants on both sides used knives, hatchets, pistols and Uzi submachine guns until Israel Defense Force soldiers intervened.
At least three Hamas rioters were injured. A ranking Palestine Liberation Organization official issued an emotional appeal for calm Sunday to the residents of Nablus. The message was broadcast over the Arab-owned Radio Monte Carlo.
Al Fatah, headed by Yasir Arafat, is the PLO’s largest faction and represents its mainstream.
Hamas originated in the Gaza Strip shortly after the intifada began in December 1987, and spread rapidly in the West Bank. It has consistently challenged the secular PLO’s claim to lead the Palestinian cause.
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