Two stabbing attacks by Palestinian aggressors on Monday sparked harsh, albeit seemingly unfounded, criticism from opposition leader Benjamin Netanyahu over the government’s decision to reopen crossings between Israel and the West Bank over the weekend.
On Monday afternoon, a Palestinian teenager stabbed two Israeli men inside a pharmacy near Jerusalem Central Bus Station, injuring them moderately, before a Border Police officer arrived at the border. place and shoot him.
The terrorist was identified in the Palestinian media as Basil Shawamra, 17, a resident of the city of Deir al-Asal al-Fauqa, near Hebron, in the southern West Bank. According to the Shin Bet security service, Shawamra did not have a legal work permit or any other authorization to enter Israel and did so illegally.
Earlier in the day, a Palestinian armed with a screwdriver attempted to stab a soldier at the Gush Etzion crossroads in the Central West Bank, but the soldier repelled him and a second soldier opened fire, wounding him.
Netanyahu’s criticism was directed against the decision to reopen Israel’s crossings with the West Bank on Saturday night. The government had initially set the closing of Rosh Hashanah’s holiday last Tuesday and Wednesday, a common practice for major Jewish and national holidays, but decided to extend it over the weekend in light of the escape of six prisoners. Palestinians from Gilboa prison security in northern Israel. The extension of the closure was largely intended to assist Israeli security forces in their search efforts, making it difficult for Israeli fugitives to cross into the West Bank.
Four of the fugitives were captured over the weekend, before the closure was lifted, while the other two remain at large and were considered extremely dangerous.
An Israeli doctor pulled an injured Palestinian, who stabbed two Israelis in Jerusalem on September 13, 2021. (Menahem KAHANA / AFP)
“Two days ago, against the vision of the police, [Prime Minister Naftali] Bennett removed the closure of Judea and Samaria. The tragic results we have seen today with the terrorist attack on Jerusalem Central Bus Station, ”Netanyahu said in a video statement, using the biblical term for the West Bank.
Opposition leader Benjamin Netanyahu speaks at a conference in Jerusalem on August 1, 2021. (Noam Revkin Fenton / Flash90)
However, none of Monday’s attacks were possible thanks to the end of the closure: the terrorist entered Jerusalem illegally, not through a crossroads; and the assailant at the intersection of Gush Etzion was in the West Bank and did not go through a checkpoint to reach the scene of the attack.
On Saturday evening, the government held a discussion on the completion of the closure, during which the police representative initially expressed reservations about the reopening of the passages in light of the increased tensions in the West Bank and Jerusalem over the rupture of the prison. However, Public Security Minister Omer Barlev, in charge of the police, told Kan’s station that Israel’s police commissioner Kobi Shabtai eventually backed the recommendation as well.
“All officials, including the police chief, recommended ending the closure,” Barlev said.
Netanyahu’s seemingly false claims about the Israeli police recommendation were repeated by nationalist media commentators, such as Channel 20 and the Zionist religious-Zionist website.
The closure also did not prevent attacks inside Israel. On Friday afternoon, while he was still in force, a Palestinian resident in the Shuafat refugee camp in Jerusalem was shot dead while trying to stab police officers in the old city of Jerusalem. A police officer was slightly injured by a bounce.