Israel sees 26% drop in Palestinian terrorist attacks in March

Figure of 123 incidents is lowest since last July; only fatality was US visitor Taylor Force; total does not include 3 Israelis killed in Istanbul terror

By JTA 8 April 2016, 7:42 pm

Edit

Israeli security and medics at the scene of a stabbing attack where one person was murdered and nine others were wounded in Jaffa Port, Tel Aviv on March 8, 2016. (Tomer Neuberg/Flash90)

The number of terrorist attacks carried out in Israeli-controlled areas in March decreased by 26 percent over February, making last month’s tally of 123 incidents the lowest recorded since July.

The only fatality among victims of March attacks inside Israel was US citizen Taylor Force, a Vanderbilt University student, who was killed in a stabbing attack on March 8 in Jaffa. That event also accounted for nine of the 26 victims wounded in terrorist attacks last month in Israel, according to data published earlier this week by the Shin Bet, Israel’s security agency.

Several Palestinians were killed last month, most of them while carrying out attacks.

Palestinian attacks in February resulted in the death of three victims and the wounding of 11 — a decrease from the slaying of five victims in January, when 28 were wounded.

Read: ‘Lone wolf intifada’ is not driven by religion, and for now it seems to be waning

The figure for March is the lowest monthly total recorded since last July, when 103 attacks were observed.

The tally includes neither the three Israeli victims of a March 19 suicide bombing in Istanbul nor the two Israelis wounded in the March 22 explosion at Brussels’ Zaventem Airport.

Simha Dimri (L), 60, Yonathan Suher (C), 40, and Avraham Goldman (R), 69, the three Israelis who were killed in a suicide bombing in Istanbul, March 19, 2016. (Photos courtesy of the families/Facebook via JTA)

In Israel and the West Bank, attacks began increasing in August, when 171 of them were documented, and rose sharply in September and October, with 223 and 620 attacks recorded in those months respectively. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in October called the escalation “a terror wave,” whereas many in the Israeli and Palestinian media dubbed it “the third intifada,” or “the knife intifada.”

But the overall number of attacks decreased to 326 in November, 246 in December, 169 in January and 155 in February.

Of the incidents recorded in March, only six were stabbing attacks. Another 92 involved firebombs and nine featured explosive charges along Israel’s fence with the Gaza Strip.