Israeli soldier killed, Palestinian teen attack suspect shot dead amid violent surge

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-66645883

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The lorry driver was shot dead after fleeing the scene

An Israeli soldier has been killed and several other people wounded in a suspected lorry ramming attack by a Palestinian in the occupied West Bank.

It comes at a tense time where deadly violence there has surged to a level not seen for some two decades.

Overnight, Palestinian militants set off an improvised explosive device near a convoy of Israeli troops in Nablus.

In Jerusalem, a 14-year-old Palestinian boy was shot dead by an Israeli police officer after allegedly stabbing a man.

According to an Israeli military official, the suspected ramming attack was carried out by a Palestinian man, who was 41 and had a permit to work in Israel. He was driving eastwards in a lorry towards the Maccabim crossing when he made a sudden U-turn.

He drove into a group of off-duty soldiers who were standing by the side of the road, dressed in uniform.

One soldier was killed. Three soldiers, two people in a passing car and a Palestinian worker were injured.

The driver of the lorry - which was not registered to him - then made off and was shot dead by Israeli security guards at another checkpoint some 6km (four miles) away. Pictures of the white pick-up truck show the windscreen riddled with bullet holes.

The checkpoint where the soldiers were allegedly targeted is on a busy main road which leads from central Israel, through the West Bank, to Jerusalem.

Overnight, violence erupted in Nablus, in the northern West Bank, as Israeli soldiers attempted to secure a route for Jewish visitors to a sensitive holy site known as Joseph's Tomb.

The location, close to Balata Refugee Camp, has been a frequent flashpoint since Israel captured the West Bank from Jordan in the 1967 Middle East war.

Four soldiers were injured when an explosive device was detonated next to them, the Israeli military said. Video shared on social media showed a large plume of white smoke rising into the air after the blast.

Some 30 Palestinians in Nablus were also injured during confrontations with the Israeli army, according to local medics.

On Wednesday evening, a teenager from occupied East Jerusalem was shot and killed by an off-duty Israeli policeman at a light railway station, not far from the Old City. The stop is on the invisible line that divides East and West Jerusalem.

Israeli witnesses said that the boy stabbed a man in the back with a kitchen knife and that other civilians tried to disarm him and scuffled with him. Israeli police say that he was then shot by an officer who was on board the train.

Some Palestinian reports have given a differing sequence of events.

Earlier in the day, a Palestinian man had been shot and seriously wounded by Israeli troops after allegedly ramming them with his car and injuring one soldier, near the southern West Bank city of Hebron.

In the past year and a half, there has been a rise in Palestinian shooting and vehicle ramming attacks against Israeli civilians and soldiers. There have also been an increased number of Israeli military raids and mass arrests in the West Bank and an upturn in violence against Palestinians by extremist settlers.

In 2023 so far, more than 180 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli fire in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, according to figures collated from PA sources. Israel says most of those killed were militants, but stone-throwing youths protesting against incursions and civilians not involved in any confrontations have also been killed.

Some 33 people - the vast majority of them civilians - have been killed in Palestinian attacks against Israelis during the same period.