Three Israeli Soldiers Wounded in Two West Bank Attacks

Two Palestinians were shot dead in a single incident after they stabbed a soldier in the southern West Bank city of Hebron, the Israeli military said.

In Thursday’s shooting attack, the military said a Palestinian got out of a auto and opened fire near the West Bank village of Hizme, on Jerusalem’s northern outskirts.

“Forces at the scene responded and shot the attacker, resulting in his death”, it said in a statement.

A Palestinian was shot and killed near the illegal Ofra settlement north of Ramallah after ramming his vehicle into a group of Israeli soldiers. Eyewitnesses said the soldiers fired a large number of live fire on the two Palestinian.

The Tel Aviv hospital treating Ahmed Dawabsheh, a second son who survived but was badly burned in the attack, denied Palestinian health ministry allegation that there had been a demand for the Palestinians to pay the hospital bill.

Palestinians have repeatedly claimed that Israel’s slow movement in making arrests in the arson reflected what they see as an unfair justice system that moves swiftly in finding Palestinian suspects in violence. The assailants carried out the attack in revenge for the 2014 killing of three Israeli teenagers in the West Bank, prosecutors said.

Abdel Rahman Barghouti, 27, attacked an Israeli soldier at a checkpoint near the village of Aboud.

Since October 1, nearly daily attacks and clashes between Palestinians and Israeli soldiers and violence between Palestinians and Israeli settlers have killed 109 Palestinians (including an Israeli Arab), 17 Israelis, an American and an Eritrean, according to an AFP count. Marco Rubio, said at the same forum that those calling for more sacrifices from Israel “are dead wrong, and they don’t understand the enduring bond between Israel and America”.

How surprising to learn that there are Palestinians who appreciate and benefit from having Israelis in the West Bank [“Israelis weigh European Union decision on labeling settlement-made goods”, The World, Nov. 30]. Violence began over tensions at a sensitive holy site in Jerusalem, sacred to Jews and Muslims, and quickly escalated and spread to the West Bank, Israel and the Gaza border.

On Friday, Palestinian security forces prevented a protest against Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas from taking place in Ramallah.