Mombasa attacks ring alarm
Security officials in Athens expressed grave concern yesterday at the possibility of violence against Israeli interests here, following the coordinated attacks on an Israeli-owned hotel and an Israeli passenger jet in Mombasa, Kenya, yesterday. Three suicide bombers killed 12 people at the hotel and another group fired two surface-to-air missiles at an Israeli Arkia airliner carrying 261 passengers as it took off from Mombasa’s airport. They missed. The previously unheard of «Army of Palestine» claimed responsibility, although suspicions were raised that the Al Qaeda network had carried out the attacks. In Greece, fears were raised that an outbreak of violence against Israeli interests abroad could come this way, as Israeli and Palestinian secret services had engaged each other in Greece in the past. Although Greek authorities had no specific information, the thought of a resurgence of Palestinian violence abroad was a cause for concern. «With these factors at play, we must be on the alert,» a senior Public Order Ministry official told Kathimerini.
