Three new stabbing attacks in Israel, West Bank

A Facebook video showed one of the masked Israeli soldiers, wearing civilian garments, opened fire at the Palestinian young man and killing him.

In the third attack, a Palestinian resident of Hebron who is in his 30s stabbed a 25-year-old Israeli man outside a shopping centre in the central Israeli town of Petah Tikva, before being apprehended by security forces and taken into custody, a police spokesperson said.

“Strategically, it’s a serious mistake not to approve construction; it will harm the settlement [project] and in the end cause harm to Jerusalem and the entire state of Israel”, he said. The 18-year-old was in intensive care, but in a stable condition after the shooting east of Bethlehem, a medic told Agence France-Presse. Another Palestinian was wounded when he was shot by police after he attempted to run over an officer at a West Bank checkpoint, police said. The series of attacks prompted Mr Netanyahu to cancel a meeting in Berlin with German Chancellor Angela Merkel scheduled for today, his office said by email.

Anger is boiling among Palestinians, meanwhile, over a string of deaths at the hands of Israeli security forces, attacks by Jewish settlers and restrictions imposed by Israel on access to a Jerusalem holy site.

“Many terror attacks in Jerusalem have been prevented or neutralized due to the quick actions and response of responsible bystanders”, it said, noting that earlier this year, the mayor helped stop a knife-wielding Palestinian attacker. That assailant then attacked and killed another Israeli man before he was shot dead by police.

Palestinian officials later said he was referring to security forces who entered the mosque to shut the doors on rioters.

The latest unrest began about three weeks ago as Palestinians barricaded themselves inside al-Aqsa mosque, located at the sacred site, and hurled stones, petrol bombs and fireworks at the police.

At the heart of the recent tensions is a hilltop compound revered by Muslims and Jews.

The unrest later spread to Arab neighbourhoods of east Jerusalem and to the West Bank, and on Tuesday there were disturbances in Jaffa, a largely Arab area of Tel Aviv.

Israeli President Reuven Rivlin said that a few radical Muslim elements, including an Islamic movement based in the country’s north, are deliberately inciting tensions over the Jerusalem shrine.

Obeidallah was shot in the chest during clashes between protesters and Israeli soldiers on Monday, but eyewitnesses to the incident claim he was returning home from school and was not involved in the demonstration.

Police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld says the man attacked the soldier after getting off a bus in the city of Kiryat Gat.