Palestinian with knife arrested in Hebron

Border Police troops arrested a Palestinian man Thursday in possession of a knife near the Tomb of the Patriarchs in Hebron, a police spokesperson said.

The man, a 26-year-old resident of the West Bank city, “aroused the suspicion” of the officers and they found a knife on his person when they searched him, police said.

The suspect was handed over to security forces for questioning.

The Tomb of the Patriarchs, a flashpoint site considered holy to Jews and Muslims alike, has been the scene of numerous stabbings and attempted stabbings since Israeli-Palestinian violence escalated last October.

In an almost identical incident earlier this month, Border Police arrested a Palestinian man in possession of a knife near the Tomb of the Patriarchs.

The Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron (photo credit: Elhanan Miller/Times of Israel)

The man had approached an Israeli checkpoint and did not respond to calls from police to stop. Israeli forces subsequently arrested him and found he was concealing a knife on his body, according to the police. Upon his arrest, the would-be assailant said he planned to attack Israeli troops, the police said.

Twenty-nine Israelis and four others have been killed in the recent wave of terror attacks. Some 200 Palestinians have also been killed, some two-thirds of them while attacking Israelis, and the rest during clashes with troops, according to the Israeli army.