Father of Five, Killed in Morag Terrorist Attack

(IFM) Gideon Rivlin, a 50-year-old Israeli father of five, was killed and three Israel Defense Forces soldiers were wounded when an explosion set off by Islamic Jihad occurred near an Israeli army jeep patrolling along the hothouses of Morag, a Jewish town in south Gaza, the Jerusalem Post reported.

Gideon Rivlin, was a private contractor who worked for the Gaza Regional Council as well as the security establishment. He was in the midst of constructing a security fence near the hothouses of Morag when the explosion occurred. Rivlin was a father of five who moved to Gush Katif in 1978.

Nir, his oldest child, gave the following account to Israel Radio: "This morning, like every morning, we went to work, my father and I. I was supposed to start working in Morag tomorrow and I asked him what the security situation was there. He said he was already on the way there to check on it. I was on my way out of the Gush [Katif], when I heard that there was an explosion in Morag. I turned around and started heading in that direction. I tried to reach him on the cell phone, but he didn’t answer me. When I got to Morag, I waited for the wounded to be evacuated, and he was not among them."

Islamic Jihad claimed responsibility for the attack, saying two of its members set off an explosion and were killed in a gun battle with troops.

Earlier today, two senior Hamas fugitives were killed in a gun battle with security forces in Karwat Bani Zeid, northeast of Ramallah.