In cold blood: 9 things to know for October 8

1. Execution terrorism: A Palestinian terrorist killed two Israelis and wounded a third in a terror attack at a factory in the West Bank’s Barkan industrial zone on Sunday.

• While terror attacks in Israel are never taken lightly, the method of killing and the location both served to send an extra shiver up the spine of the Israeli zeitgeist, and meanwhile the killer is still on the run.
• “Executed” reads the headline of populist tabloid Yedioth Ahronoth, referring to the fact that suspect Ashraf Walid Suleiman Na’alowa tied up secretary Kim Levengrond Yehezkel before shooting and killing her at close range.
• Also killed in the attack was coworker Ziv Hajbi, and a third person working at the factory was shot and wounded, though she managed to crawl under her desk and hide.
• Recounting the attack in painstaking detail, Yedioth writes that Na’alowa, who hadn’t shown up to work for two weeks, came that day, went upstairs to the offices to fix an electrical issue, headed back downstairs to get zip-ties and then returned to the offices with a Carl Gustav-style gun hidden in his bag: “For whatever reason, he zip-tied her hands, and shot her in cold blood. Afterward, the terrorist continued through the offices of the same floor and shot to death Ziv Hajbi of the accounting department.”
• Haaretz reports that after shooting the third woman, the gunman returned downstairs, where another worker tried to shoot at him. When he tried to shoot back, his gun jammed and he fled.

2. Suicide note: What might seem like a case of workplace violence in another context was determined by Israeli authorities to be a terror attack because of a suicide note he left, according to Haaretz, which reports that the note contained praise for Yasser Arafat.

• Hadashot news reports that the note was given to a friend three days ago. The friend, who did not report the note to authorities, has since been arrested and authorities are investigating whether advance knowledge of the letter could have prevented the attack.
• A source in the Palestinian Authority’s security forces tells the Ynet news site PA police are participating in efforts to apprehend Na’alowa, 23, a rare public admission of the extent of the often-touted security cooperation between Israel and the PA.
• According to the source, PA security officials believed Na’alowa would prefer to hand himself over to them, out of fear he may be killed during Israeli attempts to arrest him, or due to a belief that the PA would not hurry to turn him over to Israel.

3. Hostage plot: Some, meanwhile, see the use of the zip-ties to cuff Levengrond Yehezkel as proof of something more at play than in other terror shootings.

• Israel Hayom’s Yoav Limor asks if the killer “planned a terror attack-hostage taking and changed his mind, or possibly some sort of attack inspired by Islamic State. Or if there was something personal.”
• Yedioth’s Yossi Yehoshua also says Na’alowa may have planned to take her hostage and “it could have been much worse.”

4. Primed for an explosion: Yehoshua and others also note the potential for the West Bank to explode with violence in the wake of the attack, with the IDF fearing copycat attacks.

• Haaretz’s Yaniv Kubovich writes that security officials fear that collective punishment against Palestinian workers in the West Bank, which some in the government are pushing for under pressure from the right, could quickly make things worse, and could also have an effect on Gaza, where Israel and Hamas are wavering between a ceasefire deal and heightened border violence.
• “An outbreak of similar attacks in the West Bank now could completely alter Hamas’ position in its conflict with Israel, because the opening of a second front would pose a much more serious challenge for the Israel Defense Forces than it faces in Gaza,” he writes.

5. An attack on coexistence: The shooting is the second deadly terror attack in a row to take place at a location normally thought of as a symbol of Israeli-Palestinian coexistence in the West Bank, after a fatal stabbing last month at a commercial center in the Etzion bloc south of Jerusalem last month.

• Unlike the Gush Etzion Junction, which has seen dozens of attacks, boosters of the Barkan industrial zone, a mere 30-minute drive from Tel Aviv, have proudly pointed out that the site had never seen an attack, which they said was proof of the economic peace theory (give the Palestinians enough financial prosperity and the pangs of nationalist yearnings will wither).
• “The Barkan industrial zone sees visits every month by diplomats, members of parliament, congresspeople and others, who are impressed by the cooperation between the workers,” Israel Hayom writes, calling the shooting “an attack on coexistence.”
• (Critics argue that Israeli limits on Palestinian businesses in the West Bank stagnate economic growth to the point where many Palestinian workers are forced to rely on Israeli industrial zones for viable economic wages.)
• ToI’s Jacob Magid reports that following the attack, rather than call for separation between the sides, the government is doubling down on that idea, with Economic Minister Eli Cohen pledging to expand the industrial zone by 150 dunam (37 acres), and calling the coexistence that it helps instill a “security and economic interest.”
• And while Israeli workers tell Magid they are shocked but undeterred, Palestinians were the ones expressing worries that they could lose their jobs after the attack.
• “I don’t know how I will be able to support my six kids without this job. I really don’t know why someone would do something like this,” one Palestinian worker tells him.

6. United against unity: Some are less gung-ho about continued coexistence in the wake of the attack though, actually uniting the far-right and -left.

• Yedioth columnist Shlomo Pyoterovsky says the attack burst “the dangerous illusion” of coexistence: “These are simply two populations living side by side. What is roiling beneath surface at every moment, every minute, is war.”
• After former director of the Peace Now settlement watchdog Yariv Oppenheimer tweeted that “there is no coexistence in the settlements. There is an occupier and the occupied. Boss and employees. Whoever thinks this is a recipe for peace is mistaken,” he drew support from Tzvi Succot, the director of the far-right Otzma Yehudit organization, who retweeted the post saying that Oppenheimer “is one who gets [it].”

7. Last goodbye: The deaths of the victims also bring out an outpouring of emotion, especially in the tabloid press.

• Israel Hayom, whose top front page headline is “How can we explain to little Kai that he will grow up without a mother,” reports that Sunday was the first day Levengrond Yehezkel managed to drop off her 16-month-old at daycare without him crying. “Now it seems that was the last goodbye between the two.”
• Also pulling at the sweeter strings of her last moments, Yedioth writes about the last WhatsApp conversation she had with her older brother the night before.
• Using the language of the famous Yom Kippur prayer, Yedioth columnist hen Artzi Srour writes of the “never-ending story” of living with terror: “Whose blood will be spilled on the bus, at the entrance to the Sharon Mall in Netanya or at an intersection near their home, in the alleys of the Old City or at a hitchhiking post. Who in a suicide bombing and who in a car-ramming, who in his bed and who in his officer, who in the street and who at synagogue, while praying. Who by ax and who by gun and who by kitchen knife.”

8. No sweat over warming warning: We’ll all be dead soon anyway, or at least underwater, according to a report by the world’s leading climate scientists that finds the world headed toward inexorable climate change unless massive drastic action is taken in the next few years.

• The damning report, which is major news in the US, Britain and elsewhere, merits barely a blip in Israel. A scan of several major Hebrew websites finds almost no coverage of the report.
• Sarah Vitori, the woman injured in the Barkan terror attack, speaking to the press leads most news sites, but the climate report doesn’t even make most homepages.
• The one exception is Haaretz, which places the story fairly prominently, with reporter Zafrir Rnat noting that chances of making the actual change needed are slim in the current political climate.
• Israel’s Environmental Protection Minister Zeev Elkin, elbow deep in a race for Jerusalem’s mayoralty, has yet to say peep about it.

9. Beware the tiger: China’s Vice President Wang Qishan will visit Israel later this month, the highest-level Chinese visit to Israel in a decade, according to Channel 10 news.

• The station’s Barak Ravid notes on Twitter that the visit comes as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is considering a way to oversee Chinese investments in Israel, to keep their businesses from taking over.

• Globes reports that Alibaba chief Jack Ma will also visit Israel on the same trip, for an Innovation Conference run out of Netanyahu’s office.
• In an interview last month, Israel-Asia expert Roi Feder noted that China sees value in ties with Israel, but a trade war between Washington and Beijing is putting Israel in an awkward position.
• “Wang’s appointment signals an upgrade of the importance China sees in innovation collaboration with Israel. This change, however, comes at a time of increased challenges for Chinese firms trying to acquire technologies in other Western markets, specifically in the US. The growing trade war between the two superpowers will place Israel in a complex position which will likely see growing pressure from its US. ally to limit the access of Chinese companies to sophisticated Israeli technologies,” he told The Diplomat website. “It’s fair to assume that the White House would expect its closest ally in the Middle East to further align with its current China containment efforts. I foresee increased US pressures on Israel to limit China’s ability to easily access cutting-edge technologies and investment in strategic assets.”