Sunday 04 Oct 2015 - 14:33 Makkah mean time-21-12-1436
Jerusalem (IINA) - Israeli police have closed off access to the Old city of Jerusalem for Palestinians who are not residents of the area, after two attacks in less than 12 hours that saw the killing of two Israelis.
On Sunday morning, an Israeli teenager in the Bab Al-Amoud area of Jerusalem was stabbed by a Palestinian man who was subsequently killed by Israeli security forces, Al Jazeera news channel reported. Earlier on Saturday night, two Israeli men were killed and a woman and her son injured in a stabbing attack by a Palestinian man in occupied East Jerusalem's Old City. The Palestinian, who was shot dead after the attack, was identified as 19-year-old Muhannad Halabi from the city of al-Bireh in the central occupied West Bank, 15km north of Jerusalem. Israeli police said access to the Old City in East Jerusalem was now limited to residents of the area, local business owners, students who attend school in the area, Israeli citizens and tourists. Israeli police said the restrictions would last for two days.
Saeb Erekat, Secretary-General of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), said that the latest Palestinian violence against Israelis was a reaction to "Israel's systematic cycle of violence, its occupation and building of settlements". "The Israeli actions are an indication that (Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin) Netanyahu is trying to avoid his obligations to end this conflict and is trying to legitimize the illegal building of Jewish settlements in the occupied Palestinian Territories," Erekat said. "Netanyahu is obviously trying to copy the late Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's 2002 military operation 'Defensive Shield', which was the biggest Israeli offensive against the West Bank since the 1967 war." "Netanyahu is trying to have his own 'Defensive Shield' by sealing off Jerusalem and closing off the entire West Bank, while the world is looking elsewhere in the region."
Ahmad Ruwaidy, Jerusalem Affairs advisor to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, echoed Erekat's comments, saying the latest round of violence was a "natural reaction to Israeli policies". "The failure of the Israeli government to arrest the perpetrators or even mount a credible investigation into the killing and burning of the Dawabshe family by Israeli settlers and the constant attacks on Palestinian civilians in Jerusalem and in the West Bank, did in fact create the powder keg environment that we see today." Israeli soldiers evacuated the al-Aqsa Mosque compound after arresting at least 40 worshippers following the first attack on Saturday.
Netanyahu was due to convene an emergency meeting with security officials later on Sunday, his office said, and a security cabinet meeting on Monday. Violence has risen in East Jerusalem and the occupied West Bank in recent weeks. On Thursday, an Israeli couple was shot dead while their four children were in the car in a suspected Palestinian drive-by attack near a West Bank Jewish settlement. Israeli police and Palestinians have also clashed frequently at Jerusalem’s Al-Aqsa Mosque compound, Islam's third-holiest site, and at other Arab parts of the city. Palestinians have said they fear that increasing visits by Jewish groups to the compound, revered by Jews as the site of Biblical temples, are eroding Muslim religious control there.
Israel has pledged to maintain Muslim prayer rights at Al-Aqsa, but, citing security concerns, has frequently banned young Muslim men from entering the area. Palestinians want East Jerusalem, the West Bank and Gaza Strip, lands Israel captured in a 1967 Middle East war, for a future state. But Israel continues to build Jewish settlements in the occupied territories, a policy deemed illegal by the UN. The last round of peace talks between Palestinians and Israelis collapsed in 2014.
HA/IINA
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