One person has been killed and five others wounded in a series of shooting attacks in central Israel, Israeli police and emergency services are reporting.
The shootings reportedly occured on Sunday at three locations near the occupied West Bank city of Qalqilya, killing a 35-year-old man.
Magen David Adom, Israel’s medical emergency service, said that another man in his 40s was transferred to hospital in a critical condition.
Medical officials said they had also treated two men who were injured at a gas station near the town of Kochav Yair, one of them seriously. A man and a woman were also injured near Tzur Yitzhak, another community settlement in central Israel.
“Large police forces remain at the scene, and searches are continuing,” the police said in an earlier statement on Sunday, urging the public to remain vigilant. Local media identified the 35-year-old dead man as an Israeli citizen.
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The Israeli military reported earlier that its fighters had shot dead one suspect – an Arab-Israeli from the Arab town of Tayibe – while the second was wounded and fled.
However, according to the Times of Israel, police officers said that only one shooter was involved in the attack, and that he was shot dead following a manhunt.
The police also reported that they had retrieved the weapon used in the attack, a makeshift “Carlo” – also known as the Carl Gustav – submachine gun often used by Palestinian fighters.
Ben Gvir calls for execution
The Israeli army’s chief of staff, Eyal Zamir, issued directives for the continuation of operations in the occupied West Bank.
The military said its troops had surrounded several Palestinian villages and closed off the nearby West Bank crossing.
‘If the terrorist is caught alive he will be executed. This is the law and we will demand its implementation’
– Itamar Ben Gvir, Israeli minister
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he had held a security assessment and was monitoring the “deadly shooting attack”.
Far-right security minister Itamar Ben Gvir has called for the execution of the suspects involved in the attack.
“If the terrorist is caught alive he will be executed. This is the law and we will demand its implementation,” Ben Gvir said in a post on X.
“Jewish blood is not in vain. Whoever murders a Jew will see the hanging rope.”
Hamas said the shooting came in response to “aggression against Gaza and the continued crimes of Judaisation, extrajudicial killings, settlement expansion, raids, and daily attacks against our people in the West Bank and Jerusalem”.
“The occupation – no matter how far it goes in its oppression and crimes – will not succeed in stopping the rise of resistance in the valiant West Bank,” the group said in a statement.
Palestinian Islamic Jihad said the attack was a “natural consequence of the criminal policies pursued by the war criminal government of the Zionist entity”.
