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Two Israelis wounded in Jerusalem stabbings, attacker killed: police
JERUSALEM, May 31, 2019 (BSS/AFP) – A Palestinian stabbed and wounded two
Israelis across the Old City of annexed east Jerusalem on Friday before being
shot dead, police said, in an uptick in violence despite tight security for
Ramadan.
The attack came as tens of thousands of Muslims were due to visit the Al-
Aqsa mosque compound for the final Friday prayers of the holy month of
Ramadan and two days before a controversial Israeli march through the
predominantly Palestinian Old City.
In another incident, a Palestinian teen was shot dead by Israeli forces in
the occupied West Bank, the Palestinian health ministry said.
Palestinian media said the 16-year-old was trying to sneak through Israeli
fences to pray at Al-Aqsa, though the army did not immediately respond to
requests for comment.
In the Jerusalem incident, police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said a 19-
year-old Palestinian stabbed one Israeli near the Damascus Gate and another
near Jaffa Gate on the other side of the walled Old City.
One of the Israelis was in a critical condition and the other suffered
serious wounds, he said.
“Police units that responded at the scene saw the attacker with a knife.
The attacker was shot and killed,” Rosenfeld said.
The Old City has been the scene of numerous stabbings of Israelis by
Palestinian assailants in recent years, though a relative calm has existed
for several months.
After the attack, gates to the Old City were briefly sealed before being
reopened as thousands thronged towards the mosque for midday prayers, an AFP
journalist reported.
At least two entrances to Al-Aqsa were open at mid-morning, the journalist
said, though there was a heavy police presence and a normally-packed shopping
market was half empty.
The Al-Aqsa mosque compound is a key religious and political symbol for
Palestinians. It is also holy for Jews, who refer to it at the Temple Mount.
The attack came just two days before Israelis hold a major march to mark
Jerusalem Day, the annual commemoration of the capture of east Jerusalem in
the Six-Day War of 1967.
It was later annexed in a move not recognised by the international
community.
In December 2017, US President Donald Trump broke with decades of
bipartisan policy to recognise Jerusalem as Israel’s capital in a move that
prompted the Palestinians to cut all contacts with his administration and
which has sent tensions soaring.
Israel insists the whole of Jerusalem is its “eternal, indivisible
capital”. The Palestinians demand the city’s eastern sector as the capital of
their long promised state.
– Trump’s gift –
On Thursday evening, Trump’s son-in-law and adviser Jared Kushner met
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Jerusalem as part of a Middle
East tour before Washington unveils its long-awaited plan for Israel-
Palestinian peace.
Kushner, accompanied by Trump envoy Jason Greenblatt, arrived in Jerusalem
after earlier stops in Morocco and Jordan.
He is a key architect of the peace plan that the White House says it
intends to present in the coming weeks.
But the plan, previously delayed for an Israeli general election on April
9, could face further postponements due to Israeli politics.
Israel is set to hold another general election in September after Netanyahu
failed to form a coalition government, and the plan is widely seen as too
sensitive an issue to introduce during a political campaign.
The Palestinian leadership has rejected the peace plan without seeing it,
saying Trump has shown himself to be blatantly biased in favour of Israel.
They cite moves including declaring the disputed city of Jerusalem
Israel’s capital and cutting hundreds of millions of dollars in Palestinian
aid.
Trump has also handed Netanyahu other diplomatic coups, notably US
recognition of Israel’s 1981 annexation of the strategic Golan Heights
captured from Syria in the Six-Day War.
On Thursday, Kushner delivered Netanyahu a gift from Trump, a map of
Israel signed and approvingly annotated by the US president showing the Golan
as inside the Jewish state’s borders.
BSS/AFP/RY/1512 hrs