Israel escapes mass bombing as three buses explode near Tel Aviv

Three buses exploded in the Tel Aviv suburbs of Bat Yam and Holon on Thursday evening in what Israeli officials are calling a coordinated terrorist attack. No injuries were reported, but authorities later discovered several unexploded bombs on nearby buses, raising concerns that the attack was intended to be far deadlier.

Israeli police suspect the bombs were set on timers and meant to detonate on Friday morning, when the buses would have been filled with passengers. “We may be lucky if indeed the terrorists set these timers to the wrong hour,” police spokesman Aryeh Doron said. “But it’s too early to determine.” Tel Aviv District Police Chief Haim Sargarof suggested the attack “looks like something [that originated] in the West Bank.”

The explosions narrowly missed causing mass casualties, as the buses had just been emptied before they detonated. Bat Yam authorities described the timing as “miraculous,” saying the vehicles had reached parking lots just moments before the blasts.

No group has officially claimed responsibility for the attack, but a message circulated on a Telegram channel claiming to be from Hamas warned, “The revenge of the martyrs will not be forgotten so long as the occupier is present on our land. . . . This is a jihad of either victory or martyrdom.”

The attack came just hours after Israel faced another emotional blow with the return of the bodies of three hostages—Ariel and Kfir Bibas, and Oded Lifshitz—and the mistaken identification of a fourth, believed to be Shiri Bibas. Israeli officials later confirmed the body Hamas claimed was Shiri was, in fact, an unidentified individual.

Israeli official Benny Gantz called the attack a “mega-attack” and warned that the outcome could have been far worse. “We must not look at the result — but at the intention. We must not repeat the mistake of the attack that was prevented in Megiddo,” he said, referring to a previous bombing attempt. “To the attempt to murder dozens of Israelis on this difficult day — we must respond not only with tactical actions — but by directly intercepting the senders and the senders’ financiers, and using powerful tools against the terrorist nests themselves. We must exact a heavy price that the terrorist organizations will not forget.”

In response, Defense Minister Israel Katz ordered the Israel Defense Forces to intensify security operations in the West Bank. “In light of the severe terror attack attempts [in the Tel Aviv area] by Palestinian terror organizations against the civilian population in Israel, I instructed the IDF to increase the intensity of the counterterrorism activity in the Tulkarm refugee camp, and all the refugee camps in Judea and Samaria,” he announced. Katz warned that those aiding militants would face harsh consequences. “We will hunt down the terrorists to the bitter end and destroy the terror infrastructure in the camps used as front-line posts of the Iranian evil axis. Residents who give shelter to terror will pay a heavy price.”

The explosions have heightened security concerns across Israel, with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ordering police and Shin Bet security services to ramp up preventative operations nationwide.