Palestinian gunmen killed at least seven Israelis in a shooting outside a synagogue on the outskirts of Jerusalem on Friday, as tensions continued to rise after the biggest Israeli attack in the occupied West Bank in years.
Police said the gunman, identified as a 21-year-old resident of East Jerusalem, arrived outside the synagogue in Neve Ya’akov around 8:15 p.m. local time as worshipers were celebrating the Sabbath.
He shot several people before fleeing and was killed by police officers who were called to the scene. In addition to the deaths, police said three other people suffered injuries of varying degrees of severity.
The shooting, the deadliest in Jerusalem since 2008 and which occurred on Holocaust Remembrance Day, came a day after Israeli commandos killed nine Palestinians in an attack on the Jenin refugee camp in the West Bank that targeted militants from the Palestinian Islamic Jihad.
In response, Islamic Jihad militants in Gaza fired rockets at Israel on Thursday night, prompting Israel to bomb targets in the coastal enclave, which has been blockaded by Israel and Egypt since the militant group Hamas took power in 2007. No casualties were reported on either side.
The outbreak of violence was the first major clash since the new government of Benjamin Netanyahu, considered the most right-wing in Israel’s history, took office in December with ultranationalists in key security posts promising to take a tougher stance against the Palestinians.
Netanyahu visited the scene of the shooting on Friday night. He described the attack as “one of the most severe we have known in years”, and said that the cabinet will meet there.
“Our hearts go out to the family,” he said. “We must act with determination and calmness. I urge people not to take the law into their own hands.
Yair Lapid, a former prime minister who leads the largest opposition Yesh Atid party, said the attack was “horrifying and heartbreaking”.
“We cannot allow terrorism to rise and must respond with a firm hand to terrorists and those who send them,” he said.
Police said their initial assessment is that the gunman acted alone. There, they said they have detained 42 people related to the shooting, including members of the gunman’s family, and that they are checking whether they have a relationship with or prior knowledge of the attack.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility, although Palestinian militant groups praised the attack. Hazem Qassem, a Hamas spokesman, said the attack was a “natural response to the occupation’s criminal actions”.
Friday’s shooting follows months of near-night clashes between Israeli security forces and Palestinian militants in the West Bank, and a 56-hour conflict between Israel and militants in Gaza last August, which has exacerbated fears of long-simmering Israeli tensions- Palestine can spill over. to a larger confrontation.
Last year was the bloodiest for Palestinians in the West Bank since 2005, according to the UN, with Israeli forces killing 151 in the area after carrying out activities there following the attacks by Palestinians that began last spring and killed 31 Israelis in 2022. .
In a separate incident on Friday night, three Palestinians were hospitalized after being shot near Nablus in the northern West Bank, according to Palestinian media. The identity of the shooter was not immediately clear.
The Palestinian Authority said on Thursday night that it was suspending security cooperation with Israel in response to the attack in Jenin, prompting US officials to call on it to reverse the decision.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken is due to travel to Israel and the West Bank next week as part of a planned visit to the region. CIA chief William Burns also visited on Friday.
A spokesman for the UN secretary-general, António Guterres, said he condemned Friday’s shooting and was “deeply concerned” about the escalating violence. “It’s time for total restraint,” the spokesman said.