FIVE Israelis were killed and at least twenty-eight others wounded, some critically, when a Palestinian suicide bomber blew himself up in a crowded open-air market in the northern Israeli coastal town of Hadera yesterday.

The Palestinian militant group Islamic Jihad claimed responsibility for the attack, which was the most deadly since Israel withdrew from Gaza in August. It added that it was in revenge for the killing of one of its senior leaders in the West Bank three days ago.

The blast came hours after Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian President, hit out at militant groups, saying that they had no right to stick to the ceasefire only selectively. He gave a warning that attacks would provoke an even greater Israeli response.

As predicted, Shaul Mofaz, the Israeli Defence Minister, issued orders last night for “targeted operations” in the West Bank against Islamic Jihad. The flare-up in violence will put further pressure on the fragile truce between Israel and the Palestinians, which was struck at Sharm el-Sheikh in February.

The bomb exploded shortly before 4pm as its wearer queued at a falafel stall in the centre of Hadera market, which has been the target of explosions in the past — the last just two years ago. The powerful blast tore through the market’s flimsy wooden structures, demolishing five stalls.

Four of the dead were killed instantly by the shrapnel-packed bomb, and doctors said that another victim was dead on arrival at hospital in Hadera. Last night one of the critically wounded was flown by military helicopter for specialist treatment in Tel Aviv.

Hadera is just a few miles north of Netanya, where an Islamic Jihad suicide bomber from Tulkarem in the West Bank killed five people outside a shopping mall in July.

Islamic Jihad said that yesterday’s deadly attack was retaliation for the assassination of Lauy Saadi, its West Bank military leader, who was killed in a gunfight with undercover Israeli forces in Tulkarem refugee camp on Monday.

The bomber was named as Hassan Abu Zeid, 20, from Qabatiyah in the West Bank, who was released from an Israeli jail a month ago. The group said that it had also fired mortars from Gaza towards the Israeli town of Sderot because of the killing of its leader. Israeli helicopters fired missiles in response, destroying offices in Gaza used by Islamic Jihad and al- Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades.

Mr Abbas condemned the suicide attack, but Israeli officials and ministers said that it merely reflected the Palestinian President’s impotence in the face of the militant groups.

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