A car bomb exploded next to a bus on a road in northern Israel yesterday, killing at least seven people and injuring more than 30 in a blast that sent a black mushroom cloud billowing into the sky.
Witnesses said the explosion -- which cast a shadow over a US peace mission due to begin later this week -- turned the bus travelling between the cities of Hadera and Afula into an inferno.
"It was like an earthquake. The whole bus is burned and nothing is left of it," Meital Ziskin, a witness, told Israeli television.
"I was 60m from the bus station ... and I heard an explosion. The bus was completely shattered. I saw the bus go up in flames. It was completely wrecked," a witness told Israel Radio.
Another man, Reuven Oren, told Army radio: "It created a black mushroom cloud. It was huge."
Police said they believed an explosives-laden car drove up to the bus and exploded near the town of Pardes Hanna, about 50km north of Tel Aviv
Medics said at least seven people were killed. The Magen David Adom ambulance service said there were at least 30 casualties.
"There are many wounded and several dead," regional police chief Moshe Waldman told Israel's Channel Two television.
It was the first apparent Palestinian bombing in Israel since Oct. 10 when a suicide bomber blew up at a bus stop near Tel Aviv, killing himself and an elderly woman.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility for yesterday's blast, but Israeli officials wasted no time in assigning blame.
"Palestinian terrorists are waging war in Israel's streets, cafes and on our roads," David Baker, an official in Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's office, said. "The Palestinian Authority has become a prime authority on terror and could not care less about preventing it."
Palestinian officials have consistently denied responsibility for such attacks and have accused Israel of provoking violence with its reoccupation of Palestinian-ruled areas and killings of Palestinian civilians.
Earlier yesterday, Israeli forces postponed until later this week a limited pullback in the West Bank city of Hebron seen as a goodwill gesture coinciding with a US peace mission, Israeli security sources said.
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