Palestinian man shot dead after attempting to stab soldiers at Jerusalem checkpoint

A Palestinian assailant was shot and killed on Wednesday while trying to stab Israeli forces at a checkpoint south of Jerusalem, Israeli authorities said.

According to the Israel Police and medics, no Israeli forces were injured in the attack, which occurred at the “tunnels checkpoint” between the capital and the West Bank city of Bethlehem.

Border Police officers stationed at the checkpoint identified a suspect arriving on foot from the direction of the West Bank, police said, and during a routine inspection, the suspect presented his ID card before pulling out a knife.

The Israel Defense Forces said the assailant was then shot by a platoon commander of the Military Police’s Erez Battalion, a unit that is also stationed at the checkpoint alongside the Border Police officers.

According to the Palestinian Authority’s General Authority for Civilian Affairs, the suspect was killed, and his body was detained by Israel.

He was identified as Qussai Halaika, 28, from the town of al-Shuyukh, north of Hebron in the southern West Bank.

عاجل | مصادر محلية: الشهيد الذي ارتقى برصاص قوات الاحتلال عند حاجز الأنفاق جنوبي القدس؛ بزعم محاولته تنفيذ عملية طعن، هو الشاب قصي ماهر حلايقة من بلدة الشيوخ شمال الخليل.#قدس_بلس pic.twitter.com/S9Kx1EkjB8

— قدس بلس (@PlusQuds) January 28, 2026

Meanwhile, the military said that a Palestinian who hurled a firebomb at Israeli troops in the West Bank on Tuesday was shot dead by troops.

Palestinian Authority health officials identified the man as 20-year-old Muhammad Rajih Nasrallah.

According to the IDF, during an operation in the southern West Bank town of ad-Dhahiriya, troops spotted the suspect hurling a Molotov cocktail at the forces.

“The soldiers returned fire and eliminated the terrorist,” the army said, adding that no troops were hurt.

Footage appears to show settler severely beating Palestinian man

Elsewhere in the West Bank, new footage released Wednesday of an overnight settler attack appeared to show a group of masked Israelis repeatedly clubbing a Palestinian man as he lay helplessly on the ground.

The man was apparently on guard duty in Khirbet al-Fakhit, in the Masafer Yatta area of the southern West Bank, when footage shows several masked people arrive and immediately begin bludgeoning him, unprovoked. He suffered several skull fractures and was taken in serious condition to the hospital, where he underwent surgery, according to Palestinian media.

The IDF issued a statement saying that it arrested two Palestinian women who it claims attacked soldiers after they arrived at the scene. There were no arrests of settlers, who have been increasingly able to carry out attacks on Palestinians on a near-daily basis with almost complete impunity.

הפלסטינים מפרסמים תיעוד של האירוע אתמול בחירבת פחית במסאפר יאטא בדרום הר חברון. חמישה יהודים תוקפים באלימות קשה פלסטיני שנפצע קשה ועוד מספר בני משפחה נוספים. הפלסטיני נותח הלילה בבית החולים בחברון וסובל משברים בגולגולת. https://t.co/HcwocL94zA pic.twitter.com/zDfvsTJMpk

— Haim Goldich | חיים גולדיטש (@HGoldich) January 28, 2026

Responding to Tuesday night’s settler attacks, Democrats MK Gilad Kariv said: “Jewish terrorism in the territories has become a daily reality. Violent settlers carry out pogroms in Palestinian villages every single day.”

“IDF Central Command, the police’s [West Bank] district and the Shin Bet are not curbing this phenomenon. It is becoming increasingly clear that these bodies are deliberately turning a blind eye — whether out of fear of confronting the political echelon that gives full backing to these violent zealots, or out of silent consent to their actions,” Kariv wrote.

“Beyond the moral injustice and the disgrace, this constitutes criminal negligence on the part of the security establishment,” the MK continued, saying the attacks will lead to more violence and damage Israel’s international standing.

“I call on IDF Chief of Staff Eyal Zamir to stop ignoring this grave phenomenon and the unacceptable patterns of action and inaction of the IDF Central Command on this matter,” Kariv continued, saying Israelis must protest the attacks.

בשעה זו מתקפת מתנחלים בדרום הר חברון שכוללת הצתות, דיווחים על פצועים. מסתמן כי המתקפה מתרחשת במספר מוקדים במקביל.

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תיעוד – 27 א pic.twitter.com/07q3OTk96P

— Matan Golan (@MatanGolanPhoto) January 27, 2026

The settler attack on Tuesday night targeted the Palestinian enclave of Masafer Yatta, with dozens of Israelis reportedly torching homes in several villages.

According to the Palestinian Red Crescent Society, its own medics were stoned by settlers while trying to reach Khirbet al-Fakhit, where they treated a young man who suffered a head wound and a teenage girl whose arm was broken, both of whom were hospitalized.

Several other people suffered bruises in a settler attack on the nearby village of Khirbet al-Halawa, where settlers also stole 150 head of livestock, according to WAFA, the Palestinian Authority’s official news agency.

While Israeli security forces arrived at the scene, no arrests were made.

Settler attacks, which occur on a near-daily basis, largely go unchecked. Prosecutions of assailants are rare, and convictions are even rarer. Critics have accused the government, described as the most hardline in Israel’s history, of shrugging off the attacks.

The number of attacks by extremists against Palestinians and Israeli security forces in the West Bank rose by 27 percent in 2025 compared to the previous year, according to data released by the IDF and Shin Bet security agency earlier this month.

The number of severe incidents of “nationalistic crime” by settler extremists, classified by Israeli security bodies as terrorism, also rose by over 50%, according to the data.