Benjamin Netanyahu cancels trip as violence continues in Jerusalem and West Bank

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu canceled a trip to Germany as violence continued Wednesday in Israel and the West Bank, with attacks and clashes that injured both Palestinians and Israelis and left one Palestinian dead.

In Kiryat Gat in southern Israel, a Palestinian stabbed a soldier on a bus, grabbed his rifle and ran into a residential building where he tried to shoot a woman in her apartment.

The woman phoned her husband and said, “There’s a terrorist in the house.” She fought her assailant as he tried unsuccessfully to shoot and then stab her, before she broke free. Police arrived and shot the man to death.

“I saw my end coming; I was very lucky,” the woman, Liat Ohana, told reporters.

The Palestinian, who entered Israel illegally, was identified as Amjad Jundi, 19, from the West Bank village of Yatta.

In Jerusalem, police said an Israeli in his 30s was attacked by a young Palestinian woman who stabbed him with a knife in the Old City, near the site of Saturday’s fatal attack on two Israelis. The man, moderately injured, shot her several times with his handgun.

The woman was taken with serious injuries to a Jerusalem hospital, where one of her relatives was arrested after a brawl broke out between family members and border police securing the room.

Palestinian media identified the assailant as Shuroq Salah Dwayat, an 18-year-old college student from the east Jerusalem neighborhood of Sur Baher, where clashes erupted as police raided the family home, confiscated computers and arrested her father and a sister. Palestinians maintained the young woman was shot when she pushed back Israelis trying to remove her head scarf.

As the wave of violence continues with back-to-back incidents, Netanyahu’s office announced he was canceling Thursday’s trip to Germany, where both governments were to hold special meetings as part of events marking 50 years of diplomatic relations between the two countries.

The prime minister held a special security consultation Wednesday at the police situation room in Jerusalem, along with top police officials, the minister of public security and the city’s mayor.

“We are still in the midst of a wave of terror. We are taking strong action against terrorists, rioters and inciters,” said Netanyahu, adding that all methods and resources were being made available to fight the ongoing terror.

The fraught city was otherwise relatively quiet Wednesday, as thousands of police officers deployed since the flare-up began continued to patrol the streets. Since mid-September, police have arrested at least 270 Palestinians suspected of taking part in riots and rock and firebomb attacks, stepping up operations in Palestinian neighborhoods previously largely avoided.

Earlier Wednesday, an Israeli woman was attacked by a mob while driving near the settlement of Tekoa. From her hospital bed, Rivi Lev-Ohayoun told reporters she was trying to make a U-turn to escape a bombardment of rocks on her car when 10 Palestinians jumped on the vehicle, smashed the windows, opened the door and began beating her. She managed to drive away when one of the men fell back for a moment.

“It was a lynching. I thought I was going to die and begged for my life,” she said.

Several other drivers also were caught in the same incident; one, Josh Hasten, posted a report from the scene that went viral on Facebook and other social media.

An increasingly jittery atmosphere was evident in an announcement by the mayor of Kfar Saba, who said Wednesday he would deploy dozens of armed guards to step up security of educational facilities throughout the Israeli city, a few minutes away from the West Bank.

Confrontations between Palestinians and Israeli soldiers were reported in several places throughout the day. Near the settlement of Beit El, several hundred students from Birzeit University held a demonstration that ended in clashes. Three students were shot and arrested by undercover soldiers, with one reported to be in serious condition.

Usama Najjar, a spokesman for the Palestinian health ministry, said 10 other students were brought to Ramallah’s Palestine Medical Complex for treatment of light injuries caused by rubber-coated bullets.

Bethlehem hospital director Said Sarahneh said three people were brought to his hospital with gunshot wounds, including a 17-year-old who arrived in serious condition before being stabilized.

They appear to have been injured during or after the morning incidents near Tekoa, when one Israeli reportedly fired warning shots from his gun to deter rock-throwers.

Special correspondents Sobelman reported from Jerusalem and Abukhater from Ramallah, West Bank.