Shin Bet, Israel Police arrest DFLP cell in Isawiya
Cell consists of six members of Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine; authorities discover weapon, ammunition in raid.
By JPOST.COM STAFFMembers of DFLP 370 (photo credit: GM1E5351LZM01 Photographer: REUTERS/Ibraheem Abu)
Authorities on Wednesday arrested a cell of the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine that had been active in the northern Jerusalem neighborhood of Isawiya.In the joint Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency)-Israel Police raid, six Palestinians were arrested for throwing stones at security forces and attacking local residents whom they suspected were cooperating with Israel.Authorities uncovered a weapon and ammunition during the raid.Isawiya has been a flashpoint for anti-Israel activity. Residents marked 2012's "Nakba Day" (the Day of Catastrophe marking the anniversary of the establishment of Israel and the creation of the Palestinian diaspora) by throwing stones at authorities in the area, prompting police to arrest four people In that incident. Children as young as five years old were seen participating in the violence against security forces.In a number of incidents in recent years, Jewish civilians passing through the area were set upon by Isawiya residents.Ambulance crews report frequent assaults when summoned to help Isawiya’s own residents.The DFLP is a Marxist-Leninist group founded in 1969. After Jordan expelled the PLO in 1970, the DFLP operated out of Lebanon, then Syria.One of the group's most notorious attacks was the raid on a school in Ma'alot in 1974, when a squad of DFLP terrorists took over a school where dozens of children on a field trip from Safed were sleeping. Twenty-four people, most of them children, were killed in the attack.
