Three Palestinian residents of the West Bank were indicted Wednesday for conspiring to carry out terrorist attacks against Israelis, Channel 10 News reported.
Quoting a statement by the Shin Bet security agency, the report said that Issa Shalalda, 21, and Amar Masud, 20, both students at the Birzeit University near Ramallah, and Hazem Hamail, 24, had contacted Hamas officials on Facebook with the aim of raising funds to stage terrorist attacks against Israeli civilians and soldiers in Judea and Samaria.
Shalalda and Masud were indicted on suspicion of membership in a terrorist organization and contacting a terror operative. Hamail faces charges of contacting an enemy agent.
The three were recruited by Hamas' terror operatives in the West Bank, the report said.
"Since 2015, senior operatives with Hamas' military wing in Gaza have established and maintained secret infrastructure in Judea and Samaria with the purpose of recruiting operatives in Judea and Samaria and Israel and carrying out terrorist attacks against Israeli targets," the Shin Bet said in a statement.
"Special efforts were invested in recruiting Palestinian engineering and technology students who served as engineers and manufactured explosive devices."
The Shin Bet said Shalalda and Masud had admitted to engaging Hamas military wing operatives on social media and further implicated themselves by detailing the nature of the training they received.
Hamail's interrogation revealed that he was in contact with a Hamas operative in Gaza who maintained a fictitious Facebook profile.
He was scheduled to receive money and instructions to carry out a terrorist attack but was apprehended before their delivery, the report said.
