Two Palestinians are dead and nine are injured - including two in critical condition - after a nearly-completed four-story building collapsed in the Palestinian Authority city of Ramallah today. Arutz-7 correspondent Kobi Sela reports that IDF Binyamin Brigade Commander Col. Gal Hirsch is heading the search-and-rescue operation. "We have brought in the best of our forces and equipment, and are tapping the experience we garnered in other tragic events of this sort around the world," he said. At least one person is still believed to be trapped among the ruins. Seven ambulances from the Binyamin Regional Council Jewish communities helped transport the injured to hospital. Despite the Palestinian requests for Israeli help, the ambulances were delayed on their way to the scene of the accident by Palestinian policemen for close to an hour at the northern entrance to Ramallah, at the Ayosh Junction.

The Palestinians have stationed snipers in the area, whose job it is to protect the Israeli rescue forces. One of the IDF commanders noted that there was excellent cooperation between the IDF forces and the Palestinian police, and expressed his regret that cooperation of this nature only occurs on such occasions.

Palestinian Ungratefulness

Israel's critical aid yesterday in rescuing survivors and searching for
others under the ruins of a collapsed building in Palestinian-controlled
Ramallah never happened - if the Palestinian media are to be believed.
Palestinian Television was careful to show only Palestinian uniforms in its
coverage of the incident, and Voice of Palestine Radio did not mention the
identity of the rescue forces.  In reporting on the evacuation of the
injured to Jerusalem's Hadassah Hospital, Voice of Palestine said that they
were taken to "a hospital in occupied Jerusalem."  IDF Binyamin Brigade
Commander Col. Gal Hirsch headed the search-and-rescue operation, in which
top IDF forces and equipment were used, and seven ambulances from the
Jewish communities of Binyamin transported the injured to hospital.