The attack left one dead and eight injured, according to Israeli police.
Three men opened fire with automatic weapons on Thursday, February 22, on vehicles in a traffic jam near a Jewish colony in the occupied West Bank, near Jerusalem, according to the same source.
Violence in the West Bank, already on the rise before the start of the Gaza war on October 7 between Israel and the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas, has only intensified since.
Also read: Occupied West Bank: “If they kill our sons, we will make others”
Thursday's attack took place near the settlement of Maale Adoumim, located on a highway between Jerusalem and the Dead Sea, police said in a statement.
“The three terrorists... got out of their vehicle and began firing automatic weapons at vehicles that were in a traffic jam on the road towards Jerusalem,” police said.
“Two terrorists were neutralized on the spot. Searches carried out on the scene made it possible to locate another terrorist who was trying to escape and who was also neutralized,” added the police, who deployed significant reinforcements in this area. sector.
An AFP photographer on site saw the blood-stained asphalt, bullet holes on vehicles and the remains of the three men on the ground.
According to the Shin Bet, the Israeli internal intelligence services, the attackers are three young Palestinian adults, originally from the Bethlehem sector: Mohammed Zawahra (26 years old), his brother Kadam (31 years old) and Ahmed Al-Wahsh (31 years old).
One person was killed and eight others injured in the attack, including a pregnant 23-year-old woman in critical condition, said Magen David Adom (MDA), the Israeli equivalent of the Red Cross, and a spokesperson. word from Shaare Tzedek Hospital.
More and more weapons distributed
The attack comes days after two people were shot and killed in southern Israel's Kiryat Malakhi, and after a proposal by Israeli National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir to block Palestinian access to West Bank at the Esplanade of Mosques in East Jerusalem during the month of Ramadan.
Since the Hamas attack on October 7, the Israeli authorities have restricted access to their territory and to East Jerusalem, part of the holy city occupied and annexed by Israel and where the Esplanade is located, to Palestinians from the West Bank. busy.
Also read: Nour Shams refugee camp in the West Bank: “The Israeli army wants to destroy everything here”
“Our right to life surpasses (the right) to freedom of movement” of the Palestinians, Ben Gvir, leader of a far-right group, declared on Thursday at the scene of the attack.
"We are distributing more and more weapons. There are people who criticized me for this policy six months ago but I believe that everyone today understands that weapons save lives," he said. he added while according to initial indications from the police, two of the attackers were shot dead by armed civilians.
The West Bank is the scene of frequent attacks perpetrated by Palestinians against Israelis, and almost daily raids by the Israeli army, often deadly.
Israeli troops and settlers have killed at least 400 Palestinians in the West Bank since the start of the Gaza war, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry in Ramallah.
Israel captured the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, which was later annexed, during the 1967 Arab-Israeli War. The Palestinians claim this territory as the heart of their future independent state.
The war in Gaza was launched by Israel after the unprecedented attack by Hamas on October 7 on Israeli territory, which left around 1,160 dead in Israel, most of them civilians, according to an AFP report carried out in from official Israeli data.
The Israeli army's retaliatory offensive in Gaza has so far left 29,410 dead, the vast majority of them civilians, according to the latest report from the Hamas Ministry of Health.
With AFP
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