Gunmen Kill Settler, Four Daughters Amid Gaza Vote
Sun May 2, 2004 12:24 PM ET
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By Mark Heinrich
JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Palestinian gunmen killed a pregnant Jewish settler and her four daughters Sunday, dimming Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's chances of winning party backing for a Gaza pullout in a vote begun hours earlier.
After the attack, Israeli helicopters fired three missiles at a 12-storey Gaza City building housing a radio station of the main Palestinian militant faction Hamas, wounding at least two people, witnesses said.
President Bush has provided unprecedented guarantees for the pullout plan, which Sharon says will improve Israel's security. But Gaza's 7,500 settlers mounted a strong "No" campaign, saying withdrawal would be a "reward to terror."
Opinion polls before the vote forecast defeat for Sharon in what would be an embarrassing blow to the historic move, and Sunday's killings were widely expected to strengthen "No" sentiment in his right-wing Likud party.
"We can certainly say it will increase sympathy for the settlers, which is not good for Sharon," said a senior political source close to the prime minister.
An Israeli army spokesman said the settler family -- a woman of 34 who was eight months pregnant and daughters aged 11, nine, seven and two -- was ambushed in a car on the corridor road between Israel and Gush Katif, the main Gaza settlement.
"FROM HERE, WE WILL NOT MOVE"
Tali Hatuel had just set off to campaign against Sharon's plan. "From here, we will not move," read a bumper sticker on her car, bloodied and pocked after the hail of bullets.
Israeli troops shot dead the two gunmen shortly afterwards.
It was the first such killing in Gaza since December 2002, when a Gush Katif settler was ambushed on the same road.
The referendum of Likud's 193,000 members was not binding and Sharon's aides said that even if his plan was rejected he would present it to his cabinet and to parliament.
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