Border Police officer stabbed, wounded in West Bank; Palestinian attacker shot dead
After stabbing, suspect tussles with officer and tries to grab his gun before being shot at close range, the 9th Palestinian to be killed in West Bank violence in last four days
A Palestinian man stabbed and wounded a Border Police officer in the northern West Bank town of Huwara on Friday, before being shot dead by Israeli forces, police and medics said.
A Border Police spokesman said in a statement that a team of officers was operating in the flashpoint Palestinian town when the suspect pulled a knife and managed to stab one of the officers, lightly injuring him.
Other officers then “neutralized” the attacker, the statement said.
Graphic footage posted to social media showed a Border Police officer trying to apprehend the suspect as two other Palestinians were trying to pull him free.
An officer managed to pull the alleged stabber away from them in a headlock, but the suspect then briefly freed himself from his grasp and appeared to try and grab the officer’s automatic weapon.
The officer then allowed the weapon to fall to the ground as he pulled a handgun from a holster and fired four times point-blank, killing the suspect. He then retrieved his automatic weapon and appears to call for backup before the video clip ends.
The footage was partial and did not show the initial stabbing.
Border Police said that the officer with stab wounds was subsequently evacuated for medical treatment, as was the officer who subdued the attacker. Both were lightly wounded.
Huwara is a frequent flashpoint with a highway running through the town being a main route for settlers traveling in the northern West Bank.
A later police statement said that the incident started when the Palestinian tried to enter a vehicle with an Israeli couple in. While trying to break through the locked door, one of the occupants — an off-duty IDF officer — shot and apparently wounded the man with his handgun.
The attacker then ran at a nearby Border Police officer and stabbed him.
The dead attacker was not immediately identified, but he was the ninth Palestinian killed in West Bank violence in less than four days.
Two Palestinian terror group fighters were killed in heavy clashes with Israeli troops that broke out during a pre-dawn Thursday arrest raid near the northern West Bank’s Jenin refugee camp. Another Palestinian was killed in clashes with Israeli troops in the northern West Bank town of Yabed on Wednesday afternoon. Four Palestinians were killed in clashes with the IDF throughout the West Bank on Tuesday and another Palestinian was killed after carrying out a car-ramming attack that seriously wounded a soldier that same day.
Tensions have been high in the West Bank over the past year, with the IDF launching a major anti-terror offensive mostly focused on the northern West Bank to deal with a series of Palestinian attacks that have left 31 people in Israel and the West Bank dead since the start of the year.
The operation has netted more than 2,500 arrests in near-nightly raids, but has also left more than 150 Palestinians dead, many of them — but not all — while carrying out attacks or during clashes with security forces.
Early Thursday, two senior terrorists were killed in overnight clashes, including a top Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) field commander, sparking fears of further escalation.
Both PIJ and the Hamas terror group that rules the Gaza Strip threatened to hit back over the deaths.
Israeli officials were reportedly concerned about potential retaliation, including in the form of rocket fire from Gaza.
