A car slammed into a group of Israeli soldiers in on a west Jerusalem street late on Monday in what police called a “terrorist” attack. Of 19 people injured in the attack, 15 were from the party of soldiers, police said.
The driver was shot and killed, police said.
Two of the injured were reported to be in serious condition.
PHOTO: AP
The incident took place near Tzahal Square, near the walls of Old Jerusalem and Jaffa Gate.
Jerusalem police chief Aharon Franco told journalists the perpetrator was a Palestinian from east Jerusalem, but gave no further details about his identity or background.
“He turned his car towards a group of soldiers who were at an intersection,” Franco said. “The car then hit a wall, and a soldier shot and killed the terrorist.”
Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak said the home of the Palestinian had to be “destroyed as soon as possible” in order to dissuade others from carrying out similar acts.
Exactly two months earlier, on July 22, a Palestinian was killed by Israeli security forces after he injured 16 people when he turned an earth mover on passers-by and vehicles in Jerusalem.
That incident mimicked one 10 days earlier in which another Palestinian, also in an earth mover, killed three Israelis and injured more than 45 in the heart of Jerusalem before he himself was killed.
On March 6, eight Israeli students were shot and killed by a Palestinian who too was slain at the scene.
In each of those three instances, the perpetrators came from east Jerusalem, and Barak called for their homes to be destroyed.
Monday’s incident came at the end of a politically important day in Israel, with President Shimon Peres asking Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni to form a new government, a day after scandal-plagued Prime Minister Ehud Olmert officially stepped down.
Livni, 50, who replaced Olmert as head of the centrist Kadima party in a leadership vote last Wednesday, is set to become Israel’s second woman prime minister after Golda Meir.
She now has up to 42 days to form the new coalition. If she fails, new elections will be held within 90 days, or by March, a year early.
Meanwhile, the hardline opposition Likud party rejected an invitation by Livni yesterday to join a government of national unity.
“Livni is trying to act in a stately manner, but she’s coming across as pathetic,” a confidant of Likud leader Benjamin Netanyahu told the Israeli y-net news site.
The Likud had earlier issued a statement, formally rejecting the offer and calling for early elections.
“The citizens of Israel must be allowed to choose who will lead them and how,” it said.
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