the supermarket. Smadar, who spoke Arabic, became suspicious after two Arabic women who usually sold vegetables outside the shop entrance were told by Akhras to leave. Smadar's actions saved the lives of many, as Akhras would otherwise have exploded the device inside the supermarket. In February 2014, Israeli returned the remains of Ayat to her family as part of prisoner swaps, enabling them to arrange her funeral. Reactions The Al-Asqa Martyrs Brigade claimed responsibility in the press for the attack which the Israeli government denounced as an act of terrorism. The killings led the U.S. President George W. Bush to observe: “When an 18-year-old Palestinian girl is induced to blow herself up and in the process kills a 17-year-old Israeli girl, the future itself is dying, the future of the Palestinian people and the future of the Israeli people”. The European Union condemned "firmly" the terror attack. The Saudi Ambassador to the UK, Ghazi Abdul Rahman Algosaibi - a scholar and top politician in Saudi Arabia, wrote a poem in praise of al-Akhras, for which he was criticized by the UK and US governments, and among some Palestinians and Islamic militants, Akhras became a martyr (hero) figure, but the reaction among Akhras' family was mixed. According to Newsweek, Akhras' fiancé did not approve of violence and would have stopped her if he had known her plan. "May God forgive her for what she has done," he reportedly said. Other members of Akhras' family, which were educated and moderate, condemned suicide bombings as morally wrong. However, they said that Israeli "brutality" had left Palestinians no other choice. In the 2007 documentary To Die in Jerusalem, Akhras' mother was confronted with the mother of 17 year-old Israeli victim of the bombing, Rachel Levy, but refused to denounce her daughter's action. Novel Prima di Lasciarsi (Before We Say Goodbye) by Gabriella Ambrosio is a novel based on Ayat al-Akras' story, published in Italy in 2004 by Nutrimenti and was awarded at the Festival du Premier Romance in Chambéry, France. In 2008 the book's publication in both in Arabic and Hebrew was sponsored by Amnesty International and employed by Israeli colleges and human rights organizations working in Israel and the Palestinian Territories as an educational tool. It has then been published in the UK, Australia, and in New Zealand by Walker Books, in France as "Deuze Heures Avant"(Gallimard),in Germany as "Der Himmel uber Jerusalem"