Bulgarian Police Identify Israel Tour Bus Bomber as El Hajj Hassan

Graphic by Angelie Zaslavsky
Bulgarian police identified a Lebanese-Canadian man as the bomber of an Israeli tour bus.
The identification came from DNA evidence connected to the July 2012 attack at the Burgas airport on a bus full of Israeli tourists. Five Israeli tourists and the Bulgarian bus driver were killed.
The DNA belongs to Hassan El Hajj Hassan, a Lebanon-born Canadian citizen who arrived in Bulgaria at the end of June 2012, the Sofia News Agency reported. The evidence came from a baseball cap found in his room at a hotel in Bulgaria’s Black Sea resort of Nesebar. He is believed to have detonated the bomb in the backpack of the suicide bomber on the bus.
Israel has blamed the Lebanese-based terror group Hezbollah and Iran for the attack.
Why I became the Forward’s Editor-in-Chief
You are surely a friend of the Forward if you’re reading this. And so it’s with excitement and awe — of all that the Forward is, was, and will be — that I introduce myself to you as the Forward’s newest editor-in-chief.
And what a time to step into the leadership of this storied Jewish institution! For 129 years, the Forward has shaped and told the American Jewish story. I’m stepping in at an intense time for Jews the world over. We urgently need the Forward’s courageous, unflinching journalism — not only as a source of reliable information, but to provide inspiration, healing and hope.
