One injured in fresh stabbing attack outside Tel Aviv

One person was moderately injured in a knife attack outside Tel Aviv Wednesday evening, the latest in a series of stabbing assaults as Israel wrestles with an ongoing wave of terror.

The attack took place at 6:30 p.m. in central Petah Tikva, next to a busy shopping mall and across the street from the city’s Beilinson Hospital.

The wounded man, 25, was injured in the upper part of his torso and rushed to the hospital in moderate but stable condition, a spokesperson for the Magen David Adom rescue service said.

His name was not immediately released.

The stabber was identified by the Shin Bet security service as Tamer Younis Ahmed Vareidat, 25, from the town of Daheira, near Hebron.

“Immediately upon getting off the bus, he began to stab a citizen, who had been on the sidewalk, in the upper body,” police said in a statement. “The citizen was moderately injured. Civilians on the scene apprehended the attacker.”

Pictures broadcast shortly after the attack showed a man in a blue shirt being pinned to the ground on a sidewalk next to Jabotinsky Street, a main artery in the large Tel Aviv suburb.

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In a video, bystanders can be seen yelling and kicking the man as police try to keep them away. Meanwhile, others are seen tending to a wounded man in the street.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eEkKIh9hxjo

Police said they were treating the incident as a terror attack.

“When we arrived at the location we saw a great commotion on the side of the highway. In the bus stop a 25-year-old was lying on the ground, fully conscious. He was suffering from stab wounds to the upper body. We gave him medical treatment to save his life and transported him quickly to the trauma center at nearby Beilinson Hospital. He was in moderate, but stable condition,” paramedic Itay Teller told the Times of Israel.

Update to Petach Tikva. Attack carried out by lone terrorist who stabbed one man. Terrorist captured by security guard & police officers.

— Micky Rosenfeld (@MickyRosenfeld) October 7, 2015

The attack came hours after a Palestinian man stabbed a soldier and stole his gun, before being shot to death, in Kiryat Gat, south of Tel Aviv.

The incidents were the latest indication that a terror wave gripping Israel was spreading beyond the West Bank and Jerusalem, which have been dealing with an uptick in attacks for several days.

Four Israelis have been killed and several more injured in a string of attacks since last week, and Israeli forces have clashed with Palestinians in areas around the West Bank daily.