Topline
A Palestinian gunman reportedly shot and killed at least five people near Tel Aviv, Israel, on Tuesday, the country’s second shooting and fifth attack in the last two weeks—a surge Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett deemed a “wave of murderous Arab terrorism.”
Israeli police and paramedics gather near bodies of people killed by a gunman in Bnei Brak, Israel, … [+]
Key Facts
The gunman, riding a motorcycle, opened fire using an assault rifle in two locations in an ultra-Orthodox neighborhood, Bnei Brak, outside of Tel Aviv, killing passersby before police officers at the scene shot and killed him, Israeli police said according to the Washington Post.
Five people were killed, a spokesperson from Magen David Adom, an Israeli medical service, confirmed to Forbes.
The shooter was a Palestinian man who had previously been jailed for arms trafficking and being a member of a terrorist group, according to the New York Times, which cited an Israeli public broadcaster.
Following the attack, Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett scheduled an emergency security consultation with senior Israeli officials Tuesday night and the Israeli police said all officers would begin focusing on counterterrorism.
Crucial Quote
“We will fight terrorism with persistence, diligence and an iron fist,” Bennett said in a statement on Twitter.
Key Background
Tuesday’s shooting follows another that killed two Israeli border police officers in the Israeli city of Hadera on Monday—an attack for which the terrorist group ISIS claimed responsibility, according to CNN. A Palestinian man killed four people in the southern Israeli city of Beersheba last week, ramming a cyclist with his car before stabbing five civilians, three of whom died, according to the Times and Magen David Adom. A Palestinian man stabbed an Israeli jogger the week prior in Southern Israel, though he survived, as did two police officers who were stabbed by a Palestinian man near Jerusalem’s walled Old City earlier in March. Officials fear further attacks as the Muslim holiday of Ramadan and the Jewish holiday of Passover both approach in April, during which tensions are often heightened in the ongoing Israeli-Palestinian conflict, according to the Times.
What We Don’t Know
It is unclear if Tuesday’s shooting is at all related to the prior attacks. An official from Hamas, the Palestinian Islamic organization, did not directly claim responsibility for the attack, but a Hamas official deemed it a “quick response to the summit of shame and disgrace held in the Negev,” according to the Times, citing a Hamas-run television channel on which the official spoke. The official referred to Monday’s meeting in the Negev, Israel, between U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and the foreign ministers of Israel, Bahrain, Egypt, Morocco and the United Arab Emirates, in which the parties discussed economic and security operations in the Middle East.
Source: https://www.forbes.com/sites/masonbissada/2022/03/29/five-people-killed-in-israel-shooting-the-countrys-fifth-attack-in-the-last-last-two-weeks/