Syrian infiltrator indicted

NAZARETH - The Nazareth District Court indicted a 21-year-old Syrian resident Monday suspected of planning to abduct an IDF soldier and take him back to Syria.

Hamis Ahmed, who belongs to a faction of Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah movement, managed to infiltrate Israel's eastern border with Syria in the southern Golan Heights last month.

Soldiers managed to apprehend the attacker after

he opened fire on an IDF outpost one kilometer from the border. Ahmed later confessed to planning to kidnap an IDF soldier and was placed in custody. 

He is also charged with belonging to a terror organization and entering a military zone.

Looking for revenge

The affair goes back to March 2000 when Ahmed participated in a rally organized by the Fatah movement.

Days later he was invited to meet Fatah's regional commander, where he pledged his allegiance to the movement and promised to do all he could to "liberate Palestine."

He was subsequently subjected to rigorous physical training was sent to a Lebanese training camp specializing in gunfire.

In March of this year, Ahmed was offered the

chance to stage a terror attack on the U.S. embassy in Syria.

However he refused the job, claiming the building was guarded by Palestinian security officers, who he refused to harm.

As an alternative, Ahmed volunteered to carry out an operation against IDF troops along the Israel-Syria border, which he said would avenge the murder of his parents, killed by Israeli fire in Lebanon.

'A severe incident'

Following the incident, army officials said tough questions would be asked regarding the infiltrator's ability to cross the border.

“The IDF will thoroughly investigate this severe incident, and check how the terrorist entered and how we could have prevented this,” one official said. 

Another officer said the army was looking into the possibility that the soldiers guarding the post did failed to perform their duties properly.