[1] During the night of Monday, 7 March 1988, three armed members of the Palestine Liberation Organization[2] infiltrated the border between Israel and Egypt near Ramat Nafha, a desert terrain west of Mitzpe Ramon.

The soldiers fled on foot and the gunmen commandeered their car, and drove it north in the direction of Sde Boker, then west onto the highway connecting Beersheba with Dimona.

The hijackers demanded the release of all PLO prisoners[5] incarcerated as a result of the uprising in the occupied territories, and set a 30-minute ultimatum to see a representative of the Red Cross, or they would start executing hostages.

The event is notable as the first example of classical terrorist tactics against Israeli civilians during the First Intifada,[3] which up to that point was known as a popular uprising primarily involving civil disobedience, mass protests, demonstrations, rioting and limited violence.

These are the same individuals who are inciting disturbances in the territories", and then-Defense Minister Yitzhak Rabin described the incident as part of a major PLO effort to show that terrorism remains the principal means by which its political goals will be achieved.

Sari Nusseibeh called the hijacking a "deplorable act", and said "It's very worrying, because the whole point of the thing is to have a so-called white revolution in which people don't use any arms."

For many years, there had been a preference to use the latter, brought about by the fact that many key decision makers in top security and political positions in the Israeli government were former Sayeret Matkal officers, with loyalty to that unit.

[7] Israeli intelligence concluded that the hijacking of the bus had been planned and ordered by PLO military leader Khalil al-Wazir, and as a response, it is believed that they recommended a complex operation to assassinate him at his home in Tunis, carried out a few weeks later.