Settlers Get What Settlers Deserve

Nine people were killed and more than 40 others were injured when a suicide bomber blew himself up in the ultra-Orthodox Beit Yisrael neighborhood of Jerusalem on Saturday evening at approximately 7:15 P.M.

Three children were killed in the attack, including a one-year-old baby girl.

Of the 40 people taken to hospital, four - one of them a 7-year-old boy - were in very serious condition, one was seriously wounded, the rest moderately or lightly wounded, Israel Radio reported.

The blast occured next to a yeshiva on Haim Ozer Street, close to the Mea Shearim neighborhood, as hundreds of worshippers were leaving synagogues in the area.

The bomber stood next to a group of mothers standing with their babies in strollers at the entrance to a guesthouse and detonated a large explosive device that was strapped to his body.

The explosion took place close to a number of parked cars, at least four of which caught fire as a result of the blast, Israel Radio reported.

The Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, a military wing of Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat's Fatah movement, took responsibility Saturday night for the attack.

Al Jezeera television station identified the bomber as 19-year-old Mohammed Ahmed Dararmeh, from the Deheisheh refugee camp near the West Bank town of Bethlehem.

The residents of the refugee camp took to the streets in celebration of the attack, Israel Radio reported. Similar celebrations took place earlier in the West Bank city of Ramallah, the radio said.

An unidentifed caller to Reuters said that, "This attack is in response to the massacres that the [IDF] carried out in Balata and in Jenin [refugee camps]."

The PA released a statement condemning the bombing, saying that it opposed any attacks on civilians, Israeli or Palestinian, Israel Radio reported.

The United States also condemned the bombing, calling on Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat to stop those responsible for such attacks.

"The United States condemns in the strongest possible terms this terrorist outrage," State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said.

"Such murder of innocent citizens cannot be justified and can only harm the interests and aspirations of the Palestinian people in progress toward a better future," Boucher added. "We call upon Chairman Arafat and the Palestinian Authority to do everything possible to confront and stop the terrorists responsible for these criminal acts."

Jerusalem police chief Mickey Levy said that there had been no warnings of a terrorist attack in the Beit Yisrael neighborhood.

The area has been the site of a number of terrorist attacks in the past year. A car bomb detonated in Mea Shearim in February 2001, wounding five Israelis. An explosive device was found in a car in the neighborhood in March, but was neutralized safely by security forces.