PA forces raided home of Palestinian cop before attack, father says
Unclear if move was meant to prevent attack, or prompted Turkman’s shooting of IDF soldiers; cop’s brother was Al Aqsa Marty’s brigade member killed in 2011
Dov Lieber is a former Times of Israel Arab affairs correspondent.
Palestinian security Monday night raided the family home of a Palestinian police officer hours before he opened fire on IDF soldiers in the West Bank, according to testimony from the attacker’s father.
Muhammad Turkman, 25, wounded three soldiers with an AK-47 assault rifle on Tuesday at the Focus checkpoint, near Ramallah. One soldier was seriously hurt in the attack — his condition was later upgraded to “moderate” — while two others sustained light injuries from shrapnel, according to medical authorities.
Hours earlier, security forces burst into his family’s home in the West Bank village of Qabatiya, near Jenin, and confiscated weapons, Turkman’s parents told the Palestinian news site Quds Net on Tuesday.
However, it is not clear if security forces raided the home to prevent an attack, or if the raid itself prompted Turkman to carry out the shooting.
In a separate interview with the Arab Israeli radio station A-shams, Turkman’s father, Abdul Khaleq, said his mother had called their son after the raid, and suggested this prompted him to carry out the attack.
“His mother told Muhammad what happened, and it seems it angered him greatly. He had his personal weapon on him issued by the security forces. We don’t know what his reaction was,” the father said.
Muhammad is the second son from the Turkman family to be killed in recent years.
His brother Rabia, who was a member of Fatah’s armed wing, the Al Aqsa Martyr’s Brigade, was killed in 2011 as a result of clashes with the IDF in Ramallah, Quds Net reported.
An unnamed source told the pro-Hamas outlet Palinfo that an AK-47, a homemade cartridge and ammunition were confiscated from the Turkman home during the raid.
According to a senior Palestinian security source, Turkman was a guard at the Palestinian parliament. After his shift, he took a gun without permission and carried out the attack, Israel Radio reported on Monday.
Adnan Damiri, the spokesperson for the Palestinian Security Forces, told Israel Radio on Tuesday his side still had “nothing” in their own investigation into the shooting.
He added that the IDF does not do joint-investigations with the PA security forces, even when PA police are suspects.
Turkman is one of a handful of PA security force members who have attacked Israelis with government issued weapons over the past year.
Damiri said that their is no real pattern developing of Palestinian security forces attacking Israeli, arguing that Palestinians also turn their guns on each other, “even in the US this happens, every where the world this happens.”
‘We are all proud of him’
Turkman’s father, Abdul Khaleq Turkman, said he was proud of his son’s actions.
“If he wasn’t a man,” Abdul Khaleq Turkman told Quds Net, “he wouldn’t have done this. We are all proud of him.”
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Mohammad Turkman’s uncle told the news site the shooter had been “very normal. His parents didn’t sense anything, nor did he appear to be planning an operation.”
The uncle added that Turkman “did not devote much attention to the future. He did not plan to marry or build a home like his peers.”
Turkman’s brother Muhannad, 23, was arrested by IDF soldiers overnight after the attack. In addition, Israeli soldiers revoked the work permits belonging to members of the Turkman family, the army said.
Local Fatah chapter ‘mourns’ loss of ‘heroic martyr’
The mosques in Qabatiya announced the death of Turkman over loudspeaker and “praised his heroic action,” according to Palestinian reports.
On Monday night, the local Fatah chapter of Qabatiya reportedly blasted over a loudspeaker that it “mourns” the loss of its “heroic martyr.”
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On its official Facebook page, Fatah, the ruling party of the Palestinian Authority, praised Turkman as the “martyr policeman” in a graphic that showed him carrying a gun near the Al Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem.
Hamas, Fatah’s Islamist rival in control of the Gaza Strip, “welcomed” Turkman’s attack Monday night, and called on members of the PA security forces to carry out further attacks.
Judah Ari Gross contributed to this report.
The Times of Israel Community.