Highway 443
Highway 443Israel news photo: Flash 90

Arabs hurled rocks Wednesday at several vehicles bearing Israeli license plates on Route 443, which connects Modiin and Jerusalem. No one was reported hurt but several vehicles were damaged.

Next week, security forces are expected to carry out the instructions they were given by a High Court panel headed by Court President Dorit Beinisch, to reopen the road to Arab traffic from the Palestinian Authority.

That decision was received with consternation by a large part of the Israeli public, because of concern that reopening the road to PA traffic would make those traveling on it vulnerable to terrorist attacks. The road was completely closed off to Arab PA traffic in 2002, following a spate of fatal shootings and other terror attacks that took place there.

Two months ago, a father and his baby son were lightly wounded when Arab marauders threw a fire bomb at their car as it traveled on Highway 443 toward Jerusalem. Several days earlier, terrorists fired several bursts of automatic gunfire from a passing vehicle at an IDF position near Beit Horon, off the 443 road. No one was hurt.