Three held in Mauritania Israeli Embassy shooting - Haaretz

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Sun., February 03, 2008 Shvat 27, 5768

Israel Time: 01:23 (EST+7)

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Three held in Mauritania Israeli Embassy shooting

By Haaretz Staff and News Agencies

Tags: Embassy, violence, Mauritania

The Mauritanian authorities have apprehended three suspects believed to be connected to the shooting on the Israeli Embassy in the capital of Nouakchott, Israel Radio said yesterday morning, citing local media reports in Mauritania.

Gunmen opened fire at the Israeli Embassy early Friday, wounding three French citizens, officials and witnesses said.

The three suspects were reportedly arrested while attempting to flee a police checkpoint, according to Israel Radio. It said that according to the Mauritanian media, police discovered during an interrogation that the suspects were en route to a nearby rendezvous where a getaway car was awaiting them.

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No embassy staff were hurt in the shooting attack, Israeli Ambassador to Mauritania Boaz Bismuth told Israel Radio in a telephone conversation on Friday. The radio reported that Mauritania's foreign minister, Mohamed Saleck Mohamed el-Amin, met with Bismuth to convey his sorrow over the shooting.

Emergency services initially reported that several people were wounded in the shooting, but Bismuth said he was only aware of one person who had been hurt, a Mauritanian who lived near the embassy. A French woman outside a nightclub near the embassy was also among the wounded, officials and witnesses said.

Two witnesses told The Associated Press that the attack was carried out by a group of men who shouted "God is Great!" in Arabic before opening fire on the embassy around 2 A.M.

Hamza Ould Bilal, a taxi driver who was parked outside the VIP, a disco next to the embassy, said that six men gathered outside the club before pulling out weapons and attacking. Guards at the embassy traded fire with the gunmen, who fled on foot and jumped into a car, Bilal said.

Ali Fall, a club employee, said several men attacked the embassy with guns before fleeing in a car. The assailants also sprayed gunfire at the club, injuring three French citizens.

The woman was injured when bullets hit the car she was in. She was taken to the hospital by a companion.

The neighborhood was cordoned off by the Mauritanian military, who prevented journalists and visitors from entering. Mauritanian officials issued no immediate comment.

Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni and Ministry Director General Aaron Abramovich spoke to Bismuth shortly after the incident on Friday morning, Israel Radio reported.

Abramovich told the radio that ties with Mauritania are important to Israel and expressed the hope that they would be strengthened in the future, in the light of the peace process with the Palestinians.

Bismuth, speaking to Reuters, said: "I have received many phone calls from Mauritanian friends who are very concerned. That is the only positive thing in a very sad night ... It only happened a few hours ago, but a shooting on a foreign embassy is a very serious incident."

An Israeli security official left for Mauritania Friday morning to examine the security arrangements at the embassy, Israel Radio reported.

The attack followed recent public calls by political parties in Mauritania, an Islamic republic that straddles black and Arab Africa, for the government to sever diplomatic ties with Israel. The country is one of the few Arab League states to have relations with Israel.

On Christmas Eve, four French tourists were killed by gunmen while picnicking on the side of a road in Mauritania, an act the government blamed on a terrorist sleeper cell affiliated with Al-Qaida. Their killing led the French organizers of the famous Dakar Rally to cancel the long-standing trans-Saharan race, which would have traversed this desert nation last month.

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