Tel Aviv shooting: Market attack kills four Israelis

Four Israelis have been killed and several others injured in a shooting near Israel’s defence ministry and main army headquarters in Tel Aviv, police say.

The incident happened on Wednesday night at the Sarona Market, an area with restaurants and cafes.

At least five others were injured in the shooting and taken to the nearby Ichilov Hospital.

Reacting to the attack, Israel has suspended entry permits for 83,000 Palestinians during the holy Muslim month of Ramadan.

Israeli police initially said that there was only one attacker, but Meirav Lapidot, a spokesperson, later said two attackers had been captured after carrying out what appeared to be “a terrorist attack”.

One of the shooters was taken in for questioning, and the other, who was injured, was taken to hospital.

Attackers in disguise

Police said the attackers were two Palestinians from the same family from the town of Yatta, south of the city of Hebron in the occupied West Bank.

Haaretz newspaper reported that the attackers were disguised as ultra-Orthodox Jews.

Since October 2015, increased tensions in the occupied Palestinian territories and Israel have boiled over into violence.

In the first half year of 2016, Palestinian attacks have killed 32 Israelis and two visiting US citizens. Israeli forces have shot dead at least 196 Palestinians.

Tensions over Jewish access to a volatile and contested Jerusalem holy site, revered by Muslims as Haram al-Sharif (Noble Sanctuary) and Jews as Temple Mount, have fuelled the violence.

In a similar attack in Tel Aviv five months ago, a Palestinian with Israeli citizenship killed two people on a main shopping street and the driver of a taxi he used to flee the scene.

The assailant was killed a week later in a shootout with police at a hideout in his home village in northern Israel.

Ramadan permits halted

The announcement of the suspension of entry permits for thousands of Palestinians during Ramadan was announced on Thursday morning.

“All permits for Ramadan, especially permits for family visits from Judea and Samaria to Israel, are frozen,” said a statement from COGAT, the unit which manages civilian affairs in the occupied West Bank.

It said that 83,000 Palestinians would be affected, adding that 200 residents of the Gaza Strip who had received permits to visit relatives during Ramadan would also have access frozen.