A Palestinian motorist rammed his car into a group of soldiers in the occupied West Bank on Saturday, the Israeli military said, wounding three before another opened fire at the driver who was, according to the Palestinian health ministry, killed.
A Palestinian official said the 23-year-old was a member of the Palestinian security forces.
In Jerusalem, a man detained by Israeli police near a flashpoint holy site grabbed an officer’s gun and fired it, prompting the unit to shoot him dead, the force said, an account doubted by Arab leaders and probed by authorities.
The Jerusalem incident overnight at the edge of the Al Aqsa Mosque complex, an icon of Palestinian nationalism, came at a high point of Muslim attendance for the holy month of Ramadan amid heightened fears of an escalation in violence.
sraeli-Palestinian tensions are simmering after months of violence in areas of Jerusalem and the West Bank. Friction at Al Aqsa has set off violence in recent years.
However, the sacred site, known to Muslims as the Noble Sanctuary and to Jews as Temple Mount, remained relatively quiet on Saturday.
The slain man was identified as Mohammad Khaled al-Osaib, 26, a resident of the Bedouin town Hura in south Israel. Mansour Abbas, a lawmaker whose United Arab List party is popular there, said the man was a medical student. Abbas questioned the police account.
“All we demand is the truth,” he said.
Read the article by an Williams, Maayan Lubell and Ali Sawafta in The Canberra Times.