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MARGARET WARNER: Major furor has erupted inside Israel over an attempted assassination in Jordan. The target was this man--Khaled Mashaal--a leader of the militant Islamic movement, Hamas. On September 25, in Amman, Jordan, two men carrying Canadian passports attacked Mashaal with some kind of poison-injecting instrument. Once apprehended, his attackers were widely identified as agents of Mossad, Israel's intelligence service.
The news became public last week when Israel--responding to the demands of an infuriated King Hussein of Jordan--released the imprisoned founder of Hamas, the ailing 61-year-old Sheikh Ahmed Yassin. It was also reported that earlier King Hussein had also demanded that the Israeli government provide the antidote that saved Mashaal's life. Yesterday, Yassin returned to Gaza to a hero's welcome. Israel also released about 20 Palestinians and Jordanians from Israeli jails, and reportedly promised to free 50 more.
In return Israel won the release of the two Mossad agents. Over the weekend there were calls in the Israeli press for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's resignation. But on Sunday the prime minister's cabinet stood behind him. Yesterday Netanyahu spoke publicly for the first time about the affair. He appointed a commission to investigate the incident. But he vigorously defended the way Israel has conducted its fight against terrorism.
PRIME MINISTER NETANYAHU: In recent moths we witnessed two suicide bombings
in Jerusalem. Hundreds of our citizens were wounded and 21 Israeli men, women,
and children, small children were murdered. It was a tragedy. It was an outrage.
As prime minister it is my responsibility to do everything in my power to
fight this terrorist evil. In fighting terrorists there is always risk of
failure. We, of course, have many successes in the battle against terrorism.
We have some failures. But we do the right thing for the right reason, for
the right cause, as we've been doing all along.
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