Sheffield Club bombing

On the night of Tuesday, 7 May 2002, at approximately 11:03 pm, a suicide bombing occurred at the Sheffield Club, a crowded game club in the new industrial area of Rishon LeZion, Israel, located about 10 km south of Tel Aviv. A Palestinian suicide bomber detonated a hidden explosive device within the club, killing 15 civilians and injuring 55 people, 10 of them critically.

Following the attack, Israeli police stated that the bomber had been carrying a briefcase packed with explosives while also wearing an explosive belt. Police estimated the combined weight of the explosives at between 7 and 8 kilograms. Investigators said the briefcase also contained metal fragments and bolts, which they said were intended to maximize the number of casualties.

The Islamic militant group Hamas claimed responsibility for the bombing.

The attack was condemned by United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan.

In the aftermath, Irina Polishchuk, a Ukrainian national married to Palestinian-Arab Ibrahim Sarahne, was apprehended and convicted for her role in the bombing, specifically for helping deliver the bomber to the site of the attack. She was originally sentenced to 20 years' imprisonment.

On 18 October 2011, Polishchuk was released to the West Bank as part of the Gilad Shalit prisoner exchange between Israel and Hamas, an agreement in which Israel released a large number of Palestinian prisoners in return for the release of captured Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit.

This dossier is based on the available Wikipedia summary of the incident. Two additional contemporaneous news sources — BBC News and The Guardian — are cited by the underlying Wikipedia article as references for the event but their specific text was not available for direct review in compiling this dossier; they are included here as corroborating citations.