- Shootings after Israeli invasion of West Bank, Gaza strikes
- Israel strengthens West Bank forces
- Abbas blames Israel for escalation
JERUSALEM, Jan 28 (Portal) – Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Saturday pledged a “strong, rapid and accurate” response to a deadly Palestinian shooting attack near a synagogue on the outskirts of Jerusalem as his military pushed more troops into the occupied West Bank sent.
Seven people were killed in Friday’s attack and two others were injured in another shooting in the city on Saturday.
“We are not seeking escalation, but we are prepared for any scenario,” Netanyahu said as he convened his security cabinet, which would seek an increase in gun permits for licensed civilians to defend against street attacks.
On Saturday, in Silwan, a Palestinian neighborhood below Jerusalem’s Old City, a 13-year-old Palestinian boy opened fire on a group of Israeli passers-by, wounding two before being shot and injured by one of them, police said Walls.
The attacks came towards the end of a month of growing confrontation and followed an Israeli raid on the West Bank city of Jenin that killed nine Palestinians, including seven gunmen, and cross-border fire between Israel and Gaza.
An Israeli military spokesman said an additional battalion had been sent to the West Bank for reinforcements.
However, there was no sign that Israel was preparing for a full-scale operation, and its brief cross-border exchanges with Gaza ended without casualties.
On Monday, US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken will arrive on a two-day visit to Israel and the West Bank, where clashes have been escalating for months.
Thursday’s raid was the deadliest in years in the West Bank, where Israel has stepped up operations since a string of deadly Palestinian street attacks in its cities last year.
At least 30 Palestinians – militants and civilians – have been killed in the West Bank since the beginning of the month.
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas made no mention of the shootings in Jerusalem in a statement released by the official Palestinian agency WAFA, blaming Israel for the escalation of violence.
Abbas’ Palestinian Authority, which has limited governmental powers in the West Bank, suspended security cooperation agreements with Israel following Thursday’s raid in Jenin.
SCENE IN THE SYNAGOGUE
Friday’s attack outside a synagogue was the deadliest in the Jerusalem area since 2008. It took place in a neighborhood on land Israel annexed Jerusalem after its capture in the 1967 Middle East War, which went unrecognized internationally.
The shooter, Khaire Alkam, was a 21-year-old Palestinian from East Jerusalem. A 14-year-old boy was among the dead, police said. No group has claimed responsibility for the shooting and Alkam’s father told Portal his son has no links to militants.
Police said 42 suspects, including his family members, were arrested. Netanyahu said he would also propose sanctions against families of attackers at the cabinet meeting.
[1/6] Israeli security personnel work at a site where an alleged shooting attack took place, a police spokesman said, just outside Jerusalem’s Old City January 28, 2023. Portal/Ammar Awad
Police said Alkam arrived at 8:15 p.m. and opened fire with a handgun, hitting a number of people before he was killed by police.
Shimon Israel, 56, who lives nearby, said his family had just started eating the Sabbath when they heard gunshots and screams. He opened the window and saw his neighbor running into the street to call the police.
“I told him, ‘Eli, don’t go there. Eli don’t go.’ He just got married a year ago. A good neighbor, like a brother. He ran away. I saw him fall there,” Israel told Portal.
“Natali, his wife, ran after him. She saw someone here and tried to revive him. The terrorist came and shot them from behind and got them too,” he said.
In Tel Aviv, tens of thousands of Israelis demonstrating against Netanyahu’s plans to overhaul Israel’s judiciary began the protest with a minute’s silence for the dead.
The gunman was a relative of a 17-year-old Palestinian man who was shot dead in clashes with Israeli forces at a refugee camp in Jerusalem on Wednesday, his family said.
His father, Moussa Alkam, said he didn’t know if his son was seeking revenge. “He is neither the first nor the last young man to be martyred and we are proud of what he has done,” Alkam said.
CONDITION
At a Jerusalem hospital treating victims, Israel’s far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir said he would push for more gun permits.
“I want guns on the street. I want Israeli citizens to be able to protect themselves,” he said.
Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, leader of the pro-settler Religious Zionism party, said he would call for the acceleration of Israeli settlement plans in the West Bank, which his party hopes will eventually be annexed, although there was no indication Netanyahu would heed his demands.
Both Ben-Gvir and Smotrich are members of Netanyahu’s security cabinet.
The shooting on Friday, International Holocaust Remembrance Day, was condemned by the White House and UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, who called for “extreme restraint”.
A Ukrainian was among the dead, said Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Kyiv.
Jordan and Egypt, Arab countries that have signed peace treaties with Israel, also condemned the shooting, as did the United Arab Emirates, one of several Arab states that normalized ties with Israel just over two years ago.
Saudi Arabia, which has no formal ties with Israel, condemned the attack on civilians and said it was necessary to stop an escalation in violence.
The Iran-backed group Hezbollah in Lebanon praised the attack, as did Hamas and the smaller Islamic Jihad. Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh said Saturday the region was heading for an escalation.
Additional reporting by Ammar Awad and Eli Berlzon in Jerusalem; Nidal al-Mughrabi in Gaza and Ali Sawafta in Ramallah Letters from Dominic Evans and Maayan Lubell; Edited by Frances Kerry and Raissa Kasolowsky
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