Hours after two Hamas terrorists massacred Israelis at a gas station in the Binyamin region north of Jerusalem, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu issued a stern warning to Palestinian terror groups over the ongoing spate of attacks.
"I want to tell all those who seek to harm us – all options are open," he said in a video statement. "We will continue to fight terror with all our might and we will win."
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Israeli military spokesperson Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari said the two Hamas-affiliated perpetrators had driven to the shooting scene from the Palestinian village of Urif in the northern West Bank. The men went on a rampage at a gas station next to the Israeli settlement of Eli, the Israeli military said, north of the Palestinian city of Ramallah. They first burst into a hummus restaurant, shooting and killing three people, the army said, before heading out to the gas station and killing another person who was pumping gas into his car.
Video: GPO
A civilian bystander shot one of the assailants repeatedly until he collapsed to the ground, unmoving. Hamas identified him as Mohannad Shehada. The second assailant fled the gas station in a stolen Toyota.
After an hourslong manhunt, Israeli security forces caught him in the West Bank town of Tubas, shooting and killing him when he tried to run out of his car. Palestinian health officials identified the man as 24-year-old Khaled Sabah. The Palestinian terrorist groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad praised the attack as a response to Monday's deadly military raid.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netayahu:
"Today, next to the community of Eli, a shocking and abhorrent terrorist attack was perpetrated. https://t.co/2DMlrN5SfS pic.twitter.com/Ocv5ak5zjb— Prime Minister of Israel (@IsraeliPM) June 20, 2023
The victims were identified as Elisha Antman, 18, Harel Masoud, 21, Ofer Feirman, 66, and Nachman Shmuel Mordoff, 17. Antman was a resident of Eli. He worked at the restaurant and had just completed his studies at the high school yeshiva this week. Feirman was also a resident of the community, working as a local guard for construction projects. He had just completed a shift before he was killed, during which he kept Arab workers safe.
Masoud, a recently discharged IDF soldier, was from Yad Binyamin. Mordoff lived in the nearby community of Achiya.
"Revolutionaries in the West Bank are striking everywhere, and specifically where (Israel) does not expect it," said Hamas spokesman Hazem Qassem, describing the shooting as a "reaction to the crimes of the occupation in the Jenin camp."
Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant was set to meet with Israel's army chief and other top security officials to discuss a response to the shooting as pressure grows from Netanyahu's far-right coalition partners for a harsh crackdown on the wave of Palestinian violence.
"Now is the time for a military operation in Judea and Samaria," said National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, using the biblical term for the West Bank. From the scene of the attack, he demanded that the government launch "targeted assassinations from the air," "take down buildings," deport Palestinian assailants and impose the death penalty on terrorists.
The head of the Yesha Council, the Israeli settlers' umbrella organization, echoed the call for a "broad (military) operation." "We cannot continue to absorb these blows and hope the wave of terrorism will just pass," said Shlomo Ne'eman.
The Israeli rescue service said that one person remained in serious condition, two people in moderate condition, and another in light condition. Medics reported that they found seven people suffering from gunshot wounds in the hummus restaurant and the outside gas station. The identities and nationalities of the victims were not immediately clear.
Tuesday's shooting followed fighting in the northern Jenin refugee camp earlier this week. Later on Tuesday, a few carloads of Israeli settlers, outraged by the fatal shootings, drove to the northern Palestinian towns of Hawara and Burin and hurled stones at Palestinian houses and smashed cars.
Hawara was the scene of a deadly rampage earlier this year in which Israeli settlers set dozens of homes and cars on fire and left one Palestinian dead after a Palestinian terrorist attack killed two Israeli brothers.
The settlers on Tuesday set fire to a Palestinian's car, said Nablus official Ghassan Daghlas, and tried to burn two Palestinian homes. Some settlers opened fire toward Palestinians who ventured out of their homes to throw stones at them, he added. He said there were no immediate reports of injuries.
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