Palestinian woman shot dead in ‘stabbing attempt’
Israeli security forces kill 50-year-old East Jerusalem resident after she allegedly tried to stab Israeli officers.
A Palestinian woman was shot dead by Israeli police in Jerusalem’s Old City after she allegedly tried to stab an Israeli police officer, the latest in a five-month wave of such incidents.
The 50-year-old Palestinian woman, identified as East Jerusalem resident Fadwa Abu Teir, died on Tuesday while being transferred to hospital, sources told Al Jazeera.
Israeli police said the woman moved towards border police officers, pulled a knife from her bag and tried to stab them near Damascus Gate, the main entrance to the walled Old City in occupied East Jerusalem.
Her death increases the Palestinian toll in the violence that started in October to 188, including 17 women, of whom seven were under-age.
Twenty-eight Israelis, an American, a Sudanese and an Eritrean were also killed.
Israeli authorities say most of the Palestinians were killed while carrying out knife, gun or car-ramming attacks.
The Palestinian Authority says many of the victims were shot dead by Israeli forces during clashes or demonstrations.
The surge in violence erupted in Jerusalem in October after an increase of Israeli incursions into the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound, Islam’s holiest site outside Saudi Arabia.
Many Jews revere the site as a vestige of their biblical temples.
Riots swiftly spread to the flashpoint southern West Bank city of Hebron, where hundreds of Jewish settlers live under Israeli army guard among 200,000 Palestinians, and to other places across the Palestinian Territories and Israel.