Jewish settlers vandalized a mosque in the West Bank Wednesday, Palestinian officials said. The Israeli army said the Bilal Ibn Rabah mosque in the village of Hawara near Nablus had been vandalized by “anonymous suspects”. Two cars were also set ablaze in the village. “The Star of David symbol and the word ‘Mohammad' in Hebrew were among the graffiti painted on the wall of the mosque,” the army said in a statement, adding that the graffiti was erased by the Israeli authorities. Kamal Odeh, a Hawara resident and representative of the Palestinian Fatah party, said it was the second time settlers had attacked the village this week. They torched one car and opened fire on a shop in Hawara Monday, he said. Hamas orders closure of tunnels Hamas briefly shut down smuggling tunnels on the Egyptian border that are the lifeline of the besieged enclave, officials said Wednesday, following an Israeli alert over security in the Sinai. The move came as Israel told its citizens holidaying in Egypt's Sinai peninsula to return home immediately, citing a firm threat of an attempt to kidnap an Israeli in the resort area and smuggle him or her into Gaza. Because of the threat, Egypt asked Hamas to shut down the tunnels, security officials in the Palestinian enclave said. “We asked the tunnel operators to close down the tunnels temporarily,” a Gaza security official said. By early afternoon on Wednesday, Hamas told tunnel workers to resume operations.
