| Sbarro restaurant suicide bombing | |
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| Part of the Second Intifada militancy campaign | |
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The attack site
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| Location | Jerusalem, Israel |
| Date | August 9, 2001 2:00 pm (IDT) |
| Target | Sbarro pizza restaurant |
| Attack type | suicide bomber |
| Deaths | 15 civilians (+ 1 bomber) |
| Injured | 130 |
| Perpetrator(s) | Hamas |
The Sbarro restaurant suicide bombing was a Palestinian terrorist attack on a pizzeria in downtown Jerusalem, Israel, on August 9, 2001, in which 15 civilians were killed and 130 wounded.
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At the time of the bombing, the Jerusalem branch of the Sbarro pizza restaurant chain was located at the corner of King George Street and Jaffa Road in Jerusalem, one of the busiest pedestrian crossings in Israel. Just before 2:00 p.m. on a summer holiday afternoon, when the restaurant was filled with customers and pedestrian traffic outside was at its peak, a suicide bomber thought to be carrying a rigged guitar case or wearing an explosive belt weighing 5 to 10 kilograms, containing explosives, nails, nuts and bolts, detonated his bomb. The building was built with the same "Pal-Kal" construction technique deemed responsible for the Versailles wedding hall disaster less than three months before. Although not required to do so, owner Noam Amar added extra support columns on the advice of city inspectors.[1]
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Both Hamas and the Islamic Jihad Movement in Palestine initially claimed responsibility,[3] with Hamas saying that the attack was in response to Israel's assassination ten days earlier in Nablus of the two leading Hamas commanders Jamal Mansour and Omar Mansour as well as six civilians including two children.[4][5][6]
The suicide bomber who died in the course of carrying out the attack was later identified to be Izz al-Din Shuheil al-Masri from the Palestinian West Bank town of Aqabah. Izz al-Masri was 22 at the time and the son of a successful restaurant owner, and from an affluent land-owning family. He was escorted to the restaurant by Ahlam Tamimi, a 20-year-old female university student and part-time journalist, who had disguised herself as a Jewish tourist for the occasion. She later commented that she was not sorry for what she did and does not recognize Israel’s existence. "Despite the fact that I'm sentenced to 16 life sentences I know that we will become free from Israeli occupation and then I will also be free from the prison," she said.[7]
Tamimi was released in October 2011 in exchange for the release of captured soldier Gilad Shalit.[8] Following her release, Tamimi gave an interview which was later posted on the Internet (as translated by MEMRI) in which she stated:
I do not regret what happened. Absolutely not. This is the path. I dedicated myself to Jihad for the sake of Allah, and Allah granted me success. You know how many casualties there were [in the 2001 attack on the Sbarro pizzeria]. This was made possible by Allah. Do you want me to denounce what I did? That's out of the question. I would do it again today, and in the same manner.[9][10]
The person who constructed the explosives was a man named Abdallah Barghouti. For his part in this and a string of other attacks, in which 66 civilians were killed, he was handed down 67 life sentences on November 30, 2004.[11]
In response to the attack, Israel shut down the unofficial Palestinian "foreign office" in Jerusalem, at the Orient House.[12]
After the suicide bombing, Palestinian university students at the An-Najah University in the West Bank city of Nablus created an exhibition celebrating the one year anniversary of the Second Intifada.[13][14] The exhibit’s main attraction was a room-sized re-enactment of the bombing at Sbarro. The installation featured broken furniture splattered with fake blood and human body parts.[13] The entrance to the exhibition was illustrated with a mural depicting the bombing. The exhibit was later shut down by Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat.[15]
| Participants | Individuals | Violence | Diplomacy |
|---|---|---|---|
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Main: Other:
Influence: |
Israelis:
Palestinians: |
1920 Palestine riots |
Hussein-McMahon Correspondence
Israel, Palestine, and the United Nations |