15-Oct-18: Monday noon: Another Arab-on-Israeli stabbing attack in Samaria

The scene of today's attack [Image Source: Hamodia and Reuters]

In the third terror attack to have taken place in Israel's Samaria District over the past eight days, a Palestinian Arab man armed with a stabbing implement was thwarted in his efforts around noon today (Monday).

He was permanently prevented from completing his terrorist mission.

The attack site is a short distance away from the Israeli city of Ariel on the heavily-traveled Highway 5.

As reported by Times of Israel:

A Palestinian man was shot dead by Israeli forces Monday during an attempt to stab a soldier at the Gitai Junction in the northern West Bank, the army said. No Israeli troops were injured in the incident and the Israel Defense Forces said it has opened an investigation. Several hours after the attempted stabbing, the Kan public broadcaster reported that the assailant was a resident of Biddya, the same hometown as a 47-year-old Palestinian mother of eight who was killed late Friday night when a rock was hurled at her car in the northern West Bank.

From Ynet:

A Palestinian would-be terrorist tried to stab a soldier standing at a bus stop at the Gitai Avishar Junction on Highway 5 in the northern West Bank on Monday and was shot dead by soldiers from the Artillery Corps' 55th Battalion, who were on the scene. No Israeli troops hurt. The Gitai Avishar Junction is a busy and central intersection on the highway linking the settlement of Ariel to central Israel. Hundreds of Palestinian workers travel through the junction on their way to Israel to work. The junction was also the site of several attacks in the past, and is constantly guarded by two soldiers, who were the ones to shoot and neutralize the terrorist... An IDF reservist soldier was moderately wounded and a civilian woman was lightly wounded in a stabbing attack Thursday outside the Samaria Territorial Brigade base. The terrorist was able to escape initially, but was captured several days later. Last Sunday, terrorist Ashraf Na'alwa murdered two Israelis—Kim Levengrond Yehezkel, 28, and Ziv Hagbi, 35—in a shooting attack in the Barkan industrial zone. He is still at large.

The usual Arab channels are publicizing the attacker's name and portrait. His face can be seen here. One Arab source [here] names him as Elias Saleh Yassin from Biddya, and says he was 22 years old. It refers to him as "martyr".

Praise from Hamas was not long in coming:

"The martyrdom of Elias was a response to the crime of the settlers against the martyr Aisha Al-Rabi of the same town. It affirms the right of our people to defend themselves and resist the occupation that assaults humans and land with American support and international silence." Hamas tells "the resistance" to "continue this path that the enemy does not understand... the shortest way to liberate from occupation and to acquire the rights and the building of our Palestinian state." [Arabic source]

The propaganda-centric Ma'an News Agency headlines the English-language edition of its report on today's failed stabbing attack with this: "Palestinian shot dead after alleged stabbing attack near Salfit". Its Arabic edition by contrast is more expansive and less shy: "A martyr tried to stab soldiers north of the West Bank".  The use of the word "martyr" in Arabic-language reporting is a core element in the ongoing Arab incitement to more and worse Arab-on-Israeli terrorist violence.

It is unconscionable that Ma'an's work is funded by European governments [see "09-Jul-15: When incitement to murder is financed by foreign aid, where will the accounting come from?"]