3 killed as car crashes into Tel Aviv restaurant

Three people were killed when a car swerved onto a sidewalk and crashed into a restaurant in central Tel Aviv on Saturday night. The driver was among the fatalities.

Five more people were being treated at Ichilov Hospital for various injuries following the incident on Ben Yehuda Street.

Police said it was an accident, rather than a terrorist attack.

Police said the driver, a 41-year-old man from Ra’anana in central Israel, likely suffered a heart attack, causing him to lose control of the vehicle and veer onto the sidewalk, crashing into tables at Furama, an Asian restaurant on Ben Yehuda street. (Earlier reports had said the driver was an elderly man who suddenly lost consciousness for reasons not immediately known.)

Surveillance footage from the incident showed the car traveling at high speed from the intersection, veering onto the sidewalk on Ben Yehuda street while mowing down people standing on the corner before crashing into the tables outside the restaurant and coming to a stop.

WARNING: Graphic footage

Police were quick to put out the word that the incident was an accident and not a terror attack as Tel Aviv was still reeling from a deadly shooting rampage less than two weeks ago at the Sarona Market plaza in the city in which four people were killed and a dozen injured.

The attack on June 8 came after weeks of relative calm following months of Palestinian violence that have included stabbings, shootings, car-rammings and a suicide bombing and have claimed the lives of 33 Israelis since October 1.

Some 200 Palestinians have also died in that same time period, a majority of them while carrying out attacks, according to Israeli authorities.