Bus driver got passengers off minutes before bomb detonated Thursday night — report

A bus driver told passengers to evacuate area minutes before a bomb placed under a seat detonated, according to an Israeli television report Friday night on the botched bus bombing plot outside Tel Aviv a night earlier.

Three empty buses exploded in quick succession in parking lots in the Tel Aviv suburbs of Bat Yam and Holon Thursday night and one or two more bombs were discovered on additional buses in Holon. No casualties occurred as a result of the explosions.

There have been conflicting reports on the matter, which is thought to have been a narrowly averted large-scale terror attack, and much of the case is covered by a gag order.

Channel 12 news reported that a terrorist boarded one of the buses shortly after 8 p.m. with a bomb held in a bag, while several people were onboard.

He sat down in the back and attempted to hide the bag below a seat, the network reported, before leaving. A woman whose suspicions were raised told the driver there was a suspicious item on board.

The driver then called his superiors, who told him to get all the passengers off. As he told them he was minutes from a bus depot, his bosses told him to head there to keep the vehicle away from passersby.

After parking the bus, the driver got off, and police were called, but the bomb went off before they could arrive, destroying the vehicle.

The TV report said all the bombs apparently had the writing, “Revenge from Tulkarem” on them, in reference to the Palestinian city where Israeli forces have been operating as part of a major counterterrorism offensive in the northern West Bank.

Though Hamas’s so-called Tulkarem Battalion lauded the explosions, it stopped short of claiming the would-be attack.

Earlier Friday, the Israel Police and the Shin Bet security agency were reported to have detained a Palestinian and two Jewish Israelis in connection to the bus explosions, with Channel 12 reporting that one of the Jewish Israelis who is suspected of transporting the terrorists denied any connection to the incident.

“It’s important that you know I’m an Israeli Jewish patriot who loves the country,” he was quoted as telling investigators, while insisting that “I never in my life was involved with” Palestinians who illegally entered Israel from the West Bank.

He also reportedly complained that officers with their guns drawn burst into his home at 4 a.m. to arrest him, saying he thought they were Hamas terrorists coming to kill him.

“What motive do I have to harm my country, have you gone crazy?” he was said to add.

The Kan public broadcaster earlier reported that the Jewish Israelis are suspected of having driven the terrorists to the scene of the attack, and that the pair, from Bat Yam and Holon, are also suspected of attempted murder.

The perpetrators of the attack are still at large, the report said, adding that investigators have video footage of the explosives being laid.

Public transportation returned to normal Friday after buses were halted following the previous night’s explosions, pending security scans.

After police sappers neutralized the two undetonated explosives found on the Holon buses, Tel Aviv’s police chief told the press that the devices were affixed with a stopwatch, which he said was typical of those created in the West Bank

According to Channel 12, the devices were slated to explode on Friday morning, when the buses were in use, but went off early. Giora Eiland, a former IDF operations chief, speculated that the timers were incorrectly set.

In security consultations following the explosions, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ordered the IDF to carry out a massive counterterrorism operation in the West Bank, his office said, with the IDF later announcing the deployment of three additional battalions.

The army has been carrying out a major offensive in the northern West Bank, dubbed Operation Iron Wall, since January 21. On Friday, the army said it had detained some 90 terror suspects in the West Bank over the past week, including five overnight in the town of Iktaba near Tulkarem, and seized 15 firearms.

Both Netanyahu and Defense Minister Israel Katz visited Tulkarem on Friday.

Escalating violence in the West Bank has spilled over to the Tel Aviv area on several occasions since October 7, 2023, when thousands of Hamas-led terrorists stormed southern Israel to kill some 1,200 people and take 251 hostages.

In October 2024, Hamas terrorists from the Hebron area shot seven people dead at a train station in Jaffa.

The terror group also claimed a failed suicide attack in Tel Aviv in mid-August. The assailant was killed when his backpack exploded early, injuring a passerby, in the first attempted suicide bombing in the city in years.

Earlier that month, a Palestinian man killed two people in a stabbing attack in Holon, near Tel Aviv. On Thursday, the IDF razed the terrorist’s home in the northern West Bank.

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