Fatma Omar An-Najar (died November 23, 2006) was a Palestinian suicide bomber who lived in the Gaza Strip. On November 23, 2006, she detonated explosives she was wearing on a belt, and injured several Israeli soldiers near Beit Lahia and the Jabalia Camp in northern Gaza. Hamas claimed responsibility for the bombing. Her family said she was 64 and a grandmother.
Life
An-Najar, a veteran supporter of Hamas, lived near the Jabalia Camp in northern Gaza.[1][2] She was a mother of nine sons, and a grandmother of between 35 and 38 people.[1] During the First Intifada between 1987 and 1993, she sheltered Hamas militants including a Hamas leader, and the Israeli army demolished her home.[1] Her husband, who served time in Israeli jails,[1] died in 2005, and a grandson had fought Israeli soldiers and been shot dead[1] in 2002.[3]
Suicide bombing
On 23 November 2006, An-Najar approached Israeli soldiers, who were moving through the Jabalia Camp in northern Gaza near the town of Beit Lahia, in an operation to stem Qassam rocket fire that was being launched from Gaza into southern Israel.[4][5][6] The soldiers saw her acting suspiciously, and threw a stun grenade, which makes a loud nose but does not cause any damage.[6] She then detonated explosives she was carrying on her belt, while still at a distance from the soldiers, killing herself and slightly wounding two soldiers.[1][6][7][3]
At age 64 according to her relatives, she was by far the oldest out of the 100 Palestinian suicide bombers from the previous six years.[6] At the time that she killed herself, she was 57 according to Hamas, and her family said she was 64.[6][8] Her motivation was Israeli attacks on Jabalia Camp.[9]
Hamas, which had sponsored her attack, claimed responsibility for her suicide bombing.[1][6] Hamas spokesman Abu Obeideh said the attack was part of Hamas's tactics.[2] In her martyrdom video, An-Najar said she made the attack in the name of Hamas and its military leader Mohammed Deif.[3]