Israeli paramedics say 2 injured in New Jerusalem attack

A Palestinian gunman opened fire in East Jerusalem on Saturday, injuring two people, Israeli medics said, less than a day after another assailant killed seven people outside a synagogue in the deadliest attack in the city since 2008.

The shooting in the Palestinian neighborhood of Silwan in East Jerusalem, near the historic Old City, injured a father and son, ages 47 and 23, paramedics said. Both were fully conscious and in moderate to serious condition in hospital, doctors added.

Police said they shot the attacker, wounding him. He was rushed to a hospital, they said, and there was no further word on his condition.

Authorities recorded the scene of the attack and emergency vehicles and security forces swarmed the area as helicopters circled overhead.

Saturday’s events – just a day before US Secretary of State Antony Blinken arrived in the area – raised the possibility of an even bigger conflagration in one of the bloodiest months in Israel and the West Bank. occupied for several years. On Friday, a Palestinian gunman killed at least seven people, including a 70-year-old woman, in a Jewish settlement with a large ultra-Orthodox population in East Jerusalem, an area captured by Israel in 1967 and then annexed in an internationally unrecognized move .

The attacks are a crucial test for Israel’s new far-right government. His incendiary National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir has portrayed himself as a enforcer of law and order and has made headlines for his promises to take even stronger action against the Palestinians.

Prime Minister Benjamin said he would convene his security cabinet Saturday night, after the end of the Sabbath, to discuss a new response to the attack near the synagogue. Israeli police launched a security operation early Saturday.

Security forces deployed in the neighborhood of the 21-year-old Palestinian gunman, detaining 42 of his family members and neighbors for questioning in the At-Tur neighborhood in East Jerusalem. Police Chief Kobi Shabtai has beefed up his forces across the city and ordered police to work 12-hour shifts, statements said, urging the public to call a hotline if they see anything suspicious. .

Friday’s attack, which occurred as residents observed the Jewish Sabbath, came a day after an Israeli military raid killed nine Palestinians in the West Bank, prompting rocket fire from Gaza and Israeli airstrikes of retaliation.

Although calm appeared to settle after the limited exchange of fire between Israel and militants in Gaza, tensions were high in Jerusalem and the West Bank.

Thursday’s raid, the deadliest incursion into the occupied territory since 2002, followed a particularly bloody month that saw at least 30 Palestinians – militants and civilians – killed in clashes with Israelis in the West Bank, according to a count. from the Associated Press.

Israel says most of the dead were militants. But young people protesting the incursions and others not involved in the clashes were also killed.

Israel says its raids are intended to dismantle militant networks and thwart attacks. The Palestinians say they are further entrenching Israel’s 55-year-old occupation of the West Bank, captured along with East Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip in the 1967 Middle East war.