Palestinian with knife arrested in Hebron

Border Police troops arrested a Palestinian man Thursday in possession of a knife near the Tomb of the Patriarchs in Hebron, a police spokesperson said.

The man, a 26-year-old resident of the West Bank city, “aroused the suspicion” of the officers and they found a knife on his person when they searched him, police said.

The suspect was handed over to security forces for questioning.

The Tomb of the Patriarchs, a flashpoint site considered holy to Jews and Muslims alike, has been the scene of numerous stabbings and attempted stabbings since Israeli-Palestinian violence escalated last October.

In an almost identical incident earlier this month, Border Police arrested a Palestinian man in possession of a knife near the Tomb of the Patriarchs.

The man had approached an Israeli checkpoint and did not respond to calls from police to stop. Israeli forces subsequently arrested him and found he was concealing a knife on his body, according to the police. Upon his arrest, the would-be assailant said he planned to attack Israeli troops, the police said.

Twenty-nine Israelis and four others have been killed in the recent wave of terror attacks. Some 200 Palestinians have also been killed, some two-thirds of them while attacking Israelis, and the rest during clashes with troops, according to the Israeli army.