Palestinian teen stabs policeman in Hebron, is shot dead

A Palestinian teenager stabbed and wounded a 20-year-old Border Police officer in the West Bank city of Hebron on Saturday morning. He was shot dead by another policeman at the scene.

The 17-year-old attacker aroused suspicion as he approached a checkpoint manned by border policemen close to the Tomb of the Patriarchs. The troops asked him to present identification, at which point the youth pulled out a knife and began slashing at troops, Channel 10 television reported.

Magen David Adom paramedics treated the wounded man at the scene, before he was taken to Shaare Zedek Hospital in Jerusalem. He sustained wounds to the head and face, the Ynet news website reported.

The attack came two days after an Israeli soldier was seriously wounded when she was stabbed by a pair of assailants near the West Bank settlement of Ariel. Both attackers were shot and killed by responding security forces, the IDF said.

On Friday afternoon, security forces thwarted two attempted stabbing attacks within minutes of each other in the West Bank. The would-be assailant was shot dead in one incident; two youths were arrested in the second.

Twenty-nine Israelis and four foreign nationals have been killed in Palestinian terrorism and violence since October. Some 190 Palestinians have been killed, around two-thirds of them while attacking Israelis, and the rest during clashes with troops, according to the Israeli army.