Man who shot Tel Aviv terrorist: ‘I thought, God let the gun fire, or I’m dead’

Kobi Yekutiel, the man who shot dead the terrorist in Tel Aviv today, tells Kan news he at first thought the attack was an accident as the assailant’s car smashed into a bus stop.

Yekutiel was on his moped when he heard “a large bang behind me.”

“I thought it was a car crash and then I saw him come out [of the car] with a knife — someone huge, big, a really frightening person — and stab the first person he met near the car. I thought it’s a fight between drivers.”

But then, he says, the penny dropped as the terrorist “left the victim and started running at others to stab them.” He said he experienced no hesitation at that point.

“I pulled out the gun, he saw me. He started running toward me. There was another elderly man near me. I took a few steps back to cock the gun. As he came near me I took him out. He still didn’t fall. He continued to try to stab the man who was by me… so I hit him with another shot, and then he sat down and I took him out with two more bullets.”

Yekutiel says he was shaking as it all unfolded. “I thought ‘God let the gun fire, or I’m dead.'”