Israelis stabbed and alleged assailants shot dead

Two Palestinian youths of 13 and 15 stabbed and critically injured a 13-year-old Israeli boy riding his bike in northern Jerusalem yesterday, police said, continuing a wave of attacks in the city in which three alleged Palestinian assailants were shot dead.

Police said the older of the assailants in Pisgat Zeev, built on occupied land that Israel annexed to Jerusalem after the 1967 Middle East war, had been shot dead and the younger one wounded. An hour earlier, a Palestinian girl of 16 from the same quarter of East Jerusalem as the Pisgat Zeev attackers stabbed and wounded a paramilitary border policeman in central Jerusalem.

Four Israelis and 26 Palestinians, including eight alleged attackers and eight children, have died in 12 days of bloodshed, the worst spell of street violence for years, stirred in part by Muslim anger over increasing Jewish visits to the al-Aqsa mosque compound in Jerusalem.

Day of Rage

Palestinian groups have called for a “Day of Rage” across the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem today and the leaders of Israel’s Arab community have called for a commercial strike in their towns and villages.

Some of Israel’s Jewish residents took to the streets to protest against the attacks and demanded the government do more to restore security.

As night fell, police said they had shot dead a Palestinian on a bus near the central bus station who had tried to grab a soldier’s rifle and then grabbed the pistol of a police officer attending the scene. The soldier and another passenger were hurt.

Police also said a border policeman had shot dead a Palestinian who tried to stab him, although the account was disputed by a Palestinian passer-by, who said he had witnessed the incident and seen no knife.

The near-daily stabbings have raised speculation that Palestinians could be embarking on another uprising or intifada, reflecting a new generation’s frustrations over their veteran leadership’s failure to achieve statehood in abortive peace talks with Israel.

Police have deployed 2,000 reinforcements in Jerusalem, but Israeli leaders say they have no easy answer to “lone wolf” assailants. – (Reuters)