December 2005 HaSharon Mall Suicide Bombing

On the morning of December 5, 2005, at approximately 11:30 a.m., a suicide bomber approached the entrance to the HaSharon Mall in the coastal Israeli city of Netanya. As he neared security guards conducting an entry inspection, he detonated explosives concealed under his clothing. Five people were killed in the blast, and more than forty others were injured.

The Palestinian Islamist militant organization Palestinian Islamic Jihad claimed responsibility for the bombing. The group identified the attacker as Lotfi Abu Saada, described as being from the village of Illar in the northern West Bank. In response to the attack, Israel conducted an airstrike in Gaza that killed two senior militants.

The attack drew condemnation and reaction from officials on both sides. Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas denounced the bombing, stating that the operation against civilians caused "the most serious harm" to the Palestinian Authority's commitment to the peace process, and said the Authority would not be lenient toward whoever was found responsible. Israeli Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom characterized the attack as further evidence of what he described as inaction by the Palestinian Authority under Abbas, and referenced continuing violence including Qassam rocket attacks.

In the aftermath, Israel closed off the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Israeli Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz approved the resumption of targeted killings of Islamic Jihad operatives in the West Bank, a practice that had reportedly been suspended for several months, and ordered the Israel Defense Forces to work to regain control of West Bank areas under the influence of Palestinian Islamic Jihad. The Israeli military also planned a larger operation in Gaza in retaliation, described as the first such operation following Israel's disengagement from the Gaza Strip earlier that September.