Guard seriously wounded in Jerusalem shooting released to rehab facility

The condition of a civilian security guard seriously wounded in a shooting attack at a checkpoint near Jerusalem last month has improved, and on Tuesday he was transferred to a rehabilitation center.

Last week, Hadassah Ein Kerem Medical Center said David Morel, 30, who was shot in the head during the attack near the Shuafat refugee camp on October 8, had regained consciousness for the first time.

On Tuesday, Morel was transferred to Loewenstein Hospital Rehabilitation Center in Ra’anana.

“We are happy to transfer David to rehabilitation this morning, and wish him a successful journey,” said Dr. Guy Rosenthal, director of the hospital’s neurosurgical intensive care unit.

Rosenthal said Morel arrived at the hospital with a “very severe head injury” and underwent a complex neurosurgery before being moved to the hospital’s intensive care unit to stabilize his condition.

“With his release for rehabilitation, he still has a long way to go and we expect, and hope, to see his condition further improve,” Rosenthal said.

Dr. Guy Rosenthal, director of Hadassah Ein Kerem Medical Center’s neurosurgical intensive care unit, is seen with David Morel’s family members, as the security guard wounded in a shooting attack is released from the hospital for rehabilitation, November 8, 2022. (Hadassah Medical Center)

After immigrating from Brazil in 2017, Morel joined the IDF as a lone soldier, then became a security guard following his release from the army, according to his family.

In the attack at the checkpoint, an Israeli soldier, Sgt. Noa Lazar, 18, was killed.

The gunman, Udai Tamimi, 22, fled the scene and was killed 11 days later attempting to commit another attack at a checkpoint near the entrance of the West Bank settlement city of Ma’aleh Adumim. One security guard was lightly hurt.

On Monday, prosecutors filed indictments against two East Jerusalem men for supplying Tamimi with the gun used in the attacks.

According to the indictment, Tamimi initially purchased the gun and two magazines from an acquaintance, Nader Abu Rajib, 29. Tamimi then gave the gun to another acquaintance, Ammar Allahaliya, 25, for safekeeping, before returning to take it back from him to use in the deadly attack.

Abu Rajib and Allahaliya were charged with various weapon offenses. Prosecutors have requested they be held in custody until the end of legal proceedings.

Udai Tamimi is seen opening fire at a checkpoint near the West Bank settlement of Ma’aleh Adumim on October 19, 2022. (Video screenshot: used in accordance with Clause 27a of the Copyright Law)

Tensions have soared in the West Bank recently as the IDF has pressed on with an anti-terror offensive mostly focused on the northern West Bank.

The operation has netted more than 2,000 arrests in near-nightly raids, but has also left over 125 Palestinians dead, many of them — but not all — while carrying out attacks or during clashes with security forces.

The IDF’s anti-terror offensive in the West Bank was launched following a series of Palestinian attacks that killed 19 people in the spring of this year.

An Israeli man was killed in an attack in Hebron last month, a woman was killed in Holon in a suspected attack in September, and four soldiers have been killed in the West Bank in attacks and during the arrest operations. On Tuesday, a man died from wounds he sustained in a stabbing attack in a Palestinian village in October.