1979 Nahariya attack
| 1979 Nahariya attack | |
|---|---|
  The attack site
|
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| Location | Nahariya, Israel |
| Coordinates | 33°0′0″N 35°5′24″E / 33.00000°N 35.09000°E |
| Date | April 22, 1979 |
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Attack type
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Shooting spree, Kidnapping |
| Deaths | 4 Israeli civilians, including 2 children (+ 2 attackers) |
| Perpetrators | Four Palestinian assailants. The Palestine Liberation Front (PLF) claimed responsibility. |
The 1979 Nahariya attack (codenamed by its perpetrators as the Nasser Operation) was a raid by four Palestine Liberation Front (PLF) militants in Nahariya, Israel on April 22, 1979.
The group, consisting of Abdel Majeed Asslan, Mhanna Salim al-Muayed, and Ahmed al-Abras, and led by 16-year-old Samir Kuntar, used a small, 55 horsepower (41 kW) boat to travel from Tyre, Lebanon to Israel. During the attack they killed three Israelis, including a father and two of his young children. Another child was accidentally suffocated in efforts to hide her from the attackers. Kuntar and al-Abras were captured, convicted of murder by an Israeli court, and sentenced to several life sentences.
Both Kuntar and al-Abras were later set free in prisoner swap deals conducted between Israel and Lebanese militant organizations – al-Abras in 1985, and Kuntar in 2008.
On April 22, 1979, a group of four Palestine Liberation Front (PLF) militants entered Israel from Lebanon by boat. The group was headed by Samir Kuntar (born in 1962) and included Abdel Majeed Asslan (born in 1955), Mhanna Salim Al-Muayed (born in 1960) and Ahmed AlAbras (born in 1949) – all members of the PLF under the leadership of Abu Abbas. The group departed from the seashore of Tyre in Southern Lebanon using a 55 horse-powered motorized rubber boat with an 88 km/h speed. Their goal was to attack Nahariya, 10 kilometers away from the Lebanese border. Around midnight they arrived at the coastal town of Nahariya.
Upon landing on the beach in Nahariya, the group followed instructions issued in Beirut – which included finding a police officer and killing him. They knocked on the door of a private house and called out in Arabic via the intercom, frightening the residents into calling the police. Then, they killed responding police officer Eliyahu Shahar. According to the Israeli security services' reconstruction of the incident, Shahar was killed after he got out of his vehicle and fired two warning shots into the air. Kuntar's group responded with a massive burst of gunfire. Samir Kuntar boasted that he alone shot 30 bullets in this incident.
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