News Brief

(IsraelNN.com) Nineteen-year-old Corporal Michal Ya'akov is credited with stopping a would-be suicide bomber who tried to cross the Hawara checkpoint near Shechem Monday night. She ordered him to pass through a metal detector, which sounded a beep signaling that a further search was necessary. She told him to raise his shirt and yelled "bomb" when she saw explosive devices.

The 20-year-old terrorist then refused to lie down and began to lower his arms, apparently to set off the bomb. A commander at the checkpoint shot and killed him, and it was later discovered that he carried three pipe bombs.
 
Military sources expressed concern that Defense Minister Ehud Barak's order this week to remove dozens of roadblocks and checkpoints to ease travel restrictions for Arabs also will make it easier for terrorists to reach Israel's urban centers.