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Kenya Attacks Not Work of Palestinian Group: Shaath
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"We have every assurance that it was not a Palestinian organization, it was not a Palestinian operation," Shaath said in Berlin
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BERLIN
, November 29 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - The anti-Israeli
attacks in
Kenya
claimed by a group calling itself the "Army of Palestine"
were not the work of any Palestinian organization, Palestinian
international cooperation minister Nabil Shaath said Friday, November
29.
"We
have every assurance that it was not a Palestinian organization, it
was not a Palestinian operation," Shaath told reporters in
Berlin
after talks with Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer, reported Agence
France-Presse (AFP).
Sixteen
people died Thursday, November 28, after a car bomb exploded at an
Israeli-run hotel in
Mombasa
, while at virtually the same time, an Israeli passenger jet was
almost shot down by two missiles after
it took off from an airport in
Kenya
.
The
two missiles were "probably SAM-7s," an Israeli official
said Friday.
The
official, speaking on condition of anonymity, told AFP a launcher had
been found by Kenyan police and that "this was probably
SAM-7s," Russian-made, shoulder-fired surface-to-air missiles.
Neither
of the two missiles hit the Boeing 75.
Late
Thursday, a previously unknown group calling itself the Army of
Palestine claimed responsibility in a typewritten statement in Arabic
received in
Beirut
by a Western news agency.
In
it, the "general command" of the group, claiming to
represent the "government in exile of all
Palestine
," said it had sent two groups to carry out the attacks "to
make the world hear again the voice of Palestinian refugees."
A
Lebanese government source dismissed the claim, AFP said.
During
their talks Friday, Shaath and Fischer also discussed the so-called
"road map" aimed at resolving the conflict between
Israel
and the Palestinians.
The
plan allows for the creation of a Palestinian state within three
years.
Shaath
said the Palestinians were ready to continue "the dialogue among
ourselves, the Palestinians, the attempted dialogue with the Israelis,
and the concerted dialogue with the quartet," of the European
Union,
Russia
, United Nations and the
United States
.
Meanwhile,
the Kenyan police commissioner said Friday that a total of 12 people
have been detained in the Kenyan investigation of attacks on a hotel
and an Israeli plane in
Mombasa
.
"Ten
more people were detained today for questioning," Kenyan Police
Commissioner Philemon Abonjo told a press conference.
Two
others, a couple, were detained Thursday morning shortly after the
twin attacks
They
were arrested in a hotel neighboring the Mombasa Paradise Hotel at
Kikambala, north of
Mombasa
, which was devastated by the suicide bomb strike.
"We
are not saying they are suspects yet," Abonjo said.
The
10 include a person who police said they had detained overnight in the
center of
Mombasa
. Abonjo said all 10 were from the
Mombasa
area but did not say if they held foreign passports.
Abonjo
said the investigation so far had established that nine Kenyans and
three Israelis were killed in the attack on the hotel. The three
suicide bombers also died.
Police
spokesman King'ori Mwangi said earlier Friday another body had been
recovered from the wreckage of the hotel, but that it had not been
identified yet.
Abonjo
added that 24 Kenyans and six Israelis were injured.
The
latest violence is reminiscent of the heyday of violence against
Israelis in the 1970s and 1980s because of their brutal practices in
the occupied Palestinian territories.
It
again raised the level of tension in the region, which U.S. President
George W. Bush had hoped would remain relatively quiet as his
administration want to attack
Iraq
.
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