4 Palestinians arrested in West Bank

Israeli troops arrested four wanted Palestinians in operations across the West Bank overnight Sunday, the army said on Monday. According to Israeli Defense Forses spokeswoman, two men were apprehended in Nablus, the other two were arrested respectively in Bethlehem and Beit Rima, a village north-west of Ramallah. "They were arrested for their involvement in illegal activity," the spokeswoman told Xinhua. She declined to provide further details, allowing only that all four men were handed over to security forces for questioning. "Arrests [of Palestinians] in the West Bank are routine and carried out for a host of reasons, such as hurling rocks and petrol bombs at civilians and military personnel," a security source told Xinhua. Last week, Israel's Shin Bet domestic security service announced the arrest of a Hamas militant cell which plotted to bomb an upscale mall adjacent to the Old City in Jerusalem during the Jewish high holidays. The agency said two of the cell's four members are residents of east Jerusalem who hold Israeli ID cards and were employed as maintenance workers at the mall. They were tasked with planting an explosive device, concealed in gift wrapping, in one of its restaurants or shops.