Officers in good to moderate condition after attack by 20-year-old in Old City; one cop was hurt by so-called friendly fire
Three policemen were wounded in a stabbing attack in Jerusalem’s Old City Thursday morning, and the alleged Palestinian assailant was shot dead, officials said.
According to police, officers spotted the man acting suspiciously near the Iron Gate entrance to the Temple Mount and began to question him.
“During the examination of the suspect, he pulled out a knife and stabbed one of the officers in his upper body,” police said.
Another two officers opened fire at the attacker, later named as 20-year-old Bader Amer from the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Beit Hanina, and he was declared dead at the scene shortly thereafter.
In addition to the stabbed policeman, one officer was hurt when he was shot by so-called friendly fire as his colleagues opened fire toward the assailant.
The two officers, aged 30 and 25, were taken to Shaare Zedek hospital in good to moderate conditions, medical officials said.
A third officer who was lightly hurt in the incident — there was no immediate word on how — was taken to Hadassah Mount Scopus hospital, police and medics said.
The area was closed off as the chief of police’s Jerusalem district, Doron Turgeman, held an assessment at the scene.
The stabbing followed several attacks by Palestinians against Israeli civilians and security forces in recent days.
On Wednesday, an officer in the Israel Defense Forces was seriously wounded in a car-ramming attack at a West Bank checkpoint east of the Israeli city of Modiin and near the West Bank settlement of Beit Horon. The Palestinian attacker was shot dead.
On Sunday, a Palestinian driver plowed his vehicle into Israeli soldiers at two locations south of the West Bank city of Jericho, injuring five of them before being shot.
In a shooting terror attack on Saturday, an Israeli man was shot dead in Hebron. The terrorist was rammed by a security guard and shot dead by an off-duty soldier.
Times of Israel