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BETHLEHEM (Ma'an) -- Israel's army said Friday that its forces in the occupied West Bank thwarted a suicide bomber found at a military checkpoint south of Nablus.

A spokeswoman said a "Palestinian terrorist wearing an explosive belt under his coat" was captured before he was able to detonate it.

She said the Palestinian was arrested and is under investigation.
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Israeli force apprehends Palestinian wearing suicide belt in West Bank

Border Police apprehend young Palestinian in Tapuah Junction, wearing a jacket despite high temperatures.

By Gili Cohen and Yaniv Kubovich for Haaretz

Israeli forces detained on Friday a young Palestinian man in the West Bank who was wearing a suicide belt. A bomb disposal unit which was sent to the scene confirmed that it contained standard explosive powder.

At about 10:30 A.M., a Border Police force stationed near Tapuah Junction, south of Nablus, noticed a Palestinian man approaching their location. Despite the high temperatures on Friday, the man was wearing a heavy coat. The force then ordered the Palestinian to halt and to remove his coat, at which point they noticied that some iron pipes were placed inside the jacket.

After the man was apprehended to the Border Police said, he admitted to wearing an explosive belt. The suspect, a resident of a refugee camp near Nablus in his 20s, was immediately arrested and sent to be interrogated. The man arrived to the junction from Hawara by taxi.

"We don't have the whole picture yet," an officer with the Samaria Regional Division said. "It's not clear that the target was Tapuah Junction, he may have been waiting in the junction for someone to pick him up."

The GOC Central Command's working assumption is that the man is not associated with a terrorist organization, but was acting on his own.

Shortly after the incident it was unclear what the man's intensions were. Border Police Chief Superintendent Shlomi Yosef said that the forces were examining whether he was on a suicide mission, but added that the awareness of the Border Police force on site and the soldiers' professionalism "probably prevented a major disaster."

Public Security Minister Yitzhak Aharonovitch spoke to the soldiers that arrested the Palestinian and told them he was proud of them and of their work, according to a statement posted on his Facebook page.