This is a developing story.
TEL AVIV (JTA) — At least seven people were wounded in a terror attack in Tel Aviv as a Palestinian attacker rammed his car into people waiting at a bus stop.
Video from the scene showed the attacker then emerge from his white truck and begin stabbing patrons at a nearby street cafe. According to the Israel Police, he was shot dead by a civilian with a gun.
Multiple victims were wounded seriously in the attack, which occurred in the city’s northern district. The attacker killed on site has been identified as a man from the southern West Bank.
The attack came while a major Israeli military raid took place in the Palestinian West Bank city of Jenin, aimed at rooting out terrorist cells. It is among the largest Israeli military operations in the West Bank in decades, involving hundreds of combat soldiers. Israeli forces have killed 10 people and injured approximately 100, according to the health ministry of the Palestinian Authority, which decried the operation as a “war crime.”
Israel Police Commissioner Kobi Shabtai referenced the Jenin operation in remarks from the scene of the Tel Aviv attack on Tuesday.
“We estimate that as a result of the activity in the Judea and Samaria region, the motivation and potential for a terror attack will rise,” he said, using the Israeli government’s term for the West Bank. “Therefore, we have increased our forces. I also ask civilians to stay aware. We’ll do everything we can to provide security.”
The attack comes amid increasing violence that has largely been centered in the West Bank and Jerusalem. Dozens of Israelis and more than 100 Palestinians have been killed in violent incidents since the beginning of the year.
In April, a car rammed into a group of civilians on the Tel Aviv promenade, killing one and wounding seven. Israeli authorities characterized the incident as a terror attack, though the suspect’s family has said it was an accident. In March, a Palestinian attacker killed one person and wounded two in a shooting in Tel Aviv.
