Eight people were injured, two of them seriously, in an armed attack on a bus in central Jerusalem on Sunday, police said. announced the arrest of the shooter.
“The terrorist is in our hands,” Kan Eli Levy, a police spokesman, told Israeli public radio.
“The police were informed of a shooting against a bus near the Tomb of David (…) The police have cordoned off the site and are looking for a suspect who fled“, the same source had said before.
The Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas, which controls the Gaza Strip, hailed “a heroic operation” without formally claiming responsibility for the attack. “Our people will continue to resist and fight the occupier by all means,” the Hamas statement said.
“All those who want to harm us must know that they will pay the price for any attack against our civilians,” Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid said on Sunday.
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A strong police movement was found at the scene of the attack, near the Wailing Wall, in the Old City of Jerusalem.
Magen David Adom (MDA), the Israeli equivalent of the Red Cross, said he went to the scene after receiving reports of shots fired at a bus in Jerusalem. “There are a total of seven injured, all conscious, one woman and six men, two of whom are in serious condition. following the terrorist attack in the Old City of Jerusalem,” said Zaki Heller, MDA spokesman.
Hours later, the police raised the balance to eight wounded. “We quickly arrived at the scene. On Ma’ale Hashalom street (…) passers-by called us to attend to two men in their 30s who were injured on the bus. They were conscious and walking with injuries to the upper body,” said an MDA lifeguard in a statement released by the entity.
Gunshots and panic
“I was coming from the Western Wall. The bus was full of passengers. I stopped at the Tomb of David bus stop. That’s when the shooting started.” bus driver Daniel Kanievsky told a small group of journalists at the site.
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“I saw two people on the bus bleeding. Everybody panicked“, he added in front of the bus marked by bullet holes at the foot of the Old City of Jerusalem. Among the injured was a pregnant woman and it was decided to carry out a caesarean section, said a spokesman for Jerusalem’s Shaarei Tsedek hospital. “The mother remains intubated and is in serious condition. The baby was born well and is stable,” she added.
In the spring, 19 people, mostly Israeli civilians, were killed in attacks by Palestinians. Three Israeli Arab assailants were also killed. Israeli authorities subsequently intensified operations in the occupied West Bank. More than 50 Palestinians were killed, including combatants and civilians, in the operations and incidents in the West Bank. Last week, the Israeli army carried out a “preventive operation” against the armed Islamic Jihad movement in the Gaza Strip. The group responded by firing rockets at Israel.
At least 49 Palestinians, including Islamic Jihad fighters and children, were killed in the weekend military escalation, which culminated last Sunday with a truce reached through Egyptian mediation.
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