A Palestinian woman stabbed and wounded an Israeli guard Wednesday in Jerusalem’s Old City, adding to a string of violent attacks that has hit this country in the past week.
The guard, hospitalized with lung wounds described as “light to medium,” was escorting a woman from the Jewish Quarter to the Moslem Quarter.
Police apprehended the attacker, a 34-year-old mother of four from a refugee camp near the West Bank city of Ramallah.
The stabbing on Haggai Street, one of the busiest alleys in the Old City, added to the already high tension in Jerusalem, where police were searching for the Israeli Jew who shot dead an Arab in eastern Jerusalem Tuesday after his car was stoned.
In the Gaza Strip, meanwhile, Israeli security forces maintained a curfew on the Rafah refugee camp as searches continued for the Palestinians who killed an Israeli there Tuesday.
Police released the name of the murdered Israeli, Yehoshua Weissbrod, 44, a gas company worker from Tel Aviv, who was shot to death after mistakenly entering the refugee camp on his way to a gas terminal near the Egyptian border.
About 100 local residents were detained for questioning, according to Palestinian sources. Local sources identified the killers as members of the Hawks, an armed gang affiliated with the Palestine Liberation Organization’s mainstream Fatah faction.
In addition, the entire Gaza Strip remained sealed off for a second day, with the army barring the 40,000 or so Palestinian laborers who enter Israel proper daily to work.
The army closed off the territory following the brutal murder Sunday of two Israelis in the heart of Tel Aviv, carried out by a Gaza resident who entered Israel without a valid permit.
In Jerusalem, Arab students clashed with border police, and two rioting students were lightly wounded in the head by rubber bullets.
Jerusalem police were still searching for the killer of Juma Abdul Aziz, 60, who was shot to death Tuesday by a Jewish driver who came under a stoning attack in eastern Jerusalem. The driver fired several shots in return and fled the scene.
Jerusalem police did track down another Israeli driver who fired shots and damaged vehicles in the northern Jerusalem Arab neighborhood of Isawiya on Tuesday night. The man told police he had opened fire in self-defense, after stones had been thrown at his car.
Police confiscated his gun following questioning.
Deputy Defense Minister Mordechai Gur expressed confidence Wednesday that Israel would continue the peace process, despite the recent tension in southern Lebanon, Gaza and Jerusalem.
At the same time, Gur said, Israel would do its utmost to fight Arab terrorism.
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