Israel
Palestinian suspects arrested after attack
Three people have been killed in an attack in Elad, east of Tel Aviv. Photo: Ilia Yefimovich/dpa
© dpa-infocom GmbH
Israeli security forces have arrested two men after a deadly attack during the recent wave of terror in Israel. The suspects are Palestinians.
Three days after a deadly attack, Israeli security forces arrested two Palestinian suspects on Sunday. The men, aged 19 and 20, were arrested near the village of Elad, police said.
Three men were killed and four others injured in the attack on Thursday. A wave of terror in Israel has killed 17 people since the end of March, and an Israeli security guard was shot dead by Palestinians in the occupied West Bank.
Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett praised the security forces on Sunday, but stressed that the arrest alone was not enough. “We are at the beginning of a new phase in the war on terror.” Referring to the Hamas leadership in the Gaza Strip, Bennett emphasized: “You can’t stir things up and then rest.”
Hamas calls for violence
Hamas Gaza head Jihia al-Sinwar recently openly called for Palestinians in the West Bank and Israeli Arabs to carry out attacks in Israel. Guns, axes or knives could be used, Sinwar said a week ago. “If they want a religious war, we are ready,” he said of confrontations on the Temple Mount (Al-Haram al-Sharif) in Jerusalem. In the attack in Elad, the assassins also used an ax, which Israel saw as an implementation of Sinwar’s request. As a result, there were increasing calls for the targeted killing of the Hamas chief.
A spokesman for Hamas’ military arm on Saturday threatened an “earthquake” in the region if Israel killed Sinwar or other Hamas leaders. Hamas spokesman Abu Obeida said that Israel would have to “pay dearly in blood and destruction” in such a case.
Most recently, in November 2019, Israel killed a military chief of Islamic Jihad with an airstrike in the Gaza Strip. Militant Palestinians responded with massive rocket attacks on Israeli areas.
Meanwhile, Israel’s army on Saturday demolished the home of a Palestinian accused of murdering an Israeli settler in the northern West Bank. A 25-year-old Israeli was killed in December when the car he was traveling in came under fire.