Suspected Palestinian assailant shot and seriously hurt; officer reportedly on life support
A Palestinian man stabbed and seriously injured an Israeli Border Police officer Sunday outside Jerusalem’s Damascus Gate, police said. An officer on the scene shot the suspected assailant.
The suspect was identified as an 18-year-old Palestinian man from the West Bank, who was named by Arabic media as Yasser Yassin Tarwa of Hebron. He was seriously injured and sent to Hadassah Hospital.
The officer suffered multiple stab wounds to the neck and chest and was taken to Jerusalem’s Shaare Zedek Hospital after receiving treatment on site. The man was on life support in serious condition.
Police said they closed off the area after the incident and deployed large numbers of reinforcements across the city.
Jerusalem police chief Chico Edry told reporters on the scene that “The officer acted heroically.” He added that, “In any incident in which police officers or civilians are attacked, the terrorist should be killed (at the scene),” according to the Walla news site.
Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat said after arriving at the Damascus Gate that life in Jerusalem must continue as normal. “I call on all residents of the State of Israel to continue visiting Jerusalem and strengthen it,” he said.
Hamas took to social media after the stabbing to hail the actions of Tarwa as “heroic.”
Tensions have been on the rise between Palestinians and Israelis with the start of the month-long Ramadan holiday last week.
Sunday’s incident came two days after an Israeli man, Danny Gonen, was killed and another was moderately injured in a shooting attack outside of the West Bank settlement of Dolev on Friday. The attacker was still at large.
As reported by The Times of Israel