23-Nov-20: Four Arab-on-Israeli terror attempts; close to zero media attention

Qalandiya Crossing, the pedestrian part - seen in a 2019 photo
[Image Source]

No one was hurt. But that was surely not the intention of the perpetrators behind four terror attacks directed against Israelis in the past few days. 

In four separate attempts this past weekend, terrorists sought to carry out lethal attacks directed at Israelis targeted at random. 

Two happened on the edges of the capital, Jerusalem, a third in the country's south and the fourth in the Samaria District. None of them individually got much attention, and we don't see any media saying that four in the space of a single weekend means something.

It's reported ["Explosives placed by terrorists near Jerusalem over weekend" | Jerusalem Post. November 22, 2020] that at the Qalandiya Crossing on Jerusalem's north-eastern entrance, two explosive packages were concealed Friday night close to where vehicles drive through. One exploded but failed to cause injury or damage. Witnesses spotted two suspects arriving at the crossing, placing the explosives and fleeing from the scene. A chase ensued with Border Police eventually arresting two under-age suspects in a nearby convenience store. This Arab source names them as Khaled Salim and Ismail Abu Zaidiya, both residents of the Qalandiya "refugee camp".

It didn't end there. In taking the prisoners away, the security people were confronted by dozens of Palestinian Arabs hurling rocks at them. Riot dispersal measures were used and the melee - which could easily have become the story - ended with no injuries.

The second attempt, on Friday night at the ancient Rachel's Tomb near Bethlehem, was thwarted when a lookout spotted a suspect placing an explosive close to the walled complex and running away from the scene. He was pursued by Border Police who caught up with him and placed him under arrest. He is an 18-year-old male from a so-called refugee camp in the Bethlehem area. His explosive failed to detonate.

IDF forces apprehending a terror suspect this past weekend.
No one was hurt which - being Israelis - was the intention.
[Image Source]

A media release quoted in the Jerusalem Post report says "Border Police are working in the Jerusalem Envelope area to strengthen deterrence and thwart terrorism while increasing the deployment of forces in sensitive places where there have been recent attempts to harm civilians and security forces."

Then Saturday night around 9:30 pm, a rocket fired from the Gaza Strip into Israel set off the Tzeva Adom (Color Red) missile attack sirens in the southern coastal city of Ashkelon, according to a Ynet report. The resulting explosion caused damage to a warehouse in an industrial zone of the city. But fortunately no injuries - and to state the obvious (whenever missiles are fired into cities by malevolents totally indifferent to outcomes) this could have been a far more troubling event.

Then on Sunday morning in a third hidden explosives incident reported by Jerusalem Post - making it the fourth terror event of this weekend - IDF combat soldiers carrying out routine searches uncovered camouflaged explosives placed just outside the village of al-Mughayyir, south of Jenin. The military assessment is the intention of those who planted the explosives was to harm Israeli soldiers.

Seems a good time to mention that, for the Palestinian Authority, "...rewarding terrorists is not about social welfare. It is about incentivizing and rewarding terror and murder. “Pay for slay” is an abomination that should enjoy universal condemnation." Those sentiments, which are easy to agree with, come from "Lies, damn lies and Palestinian Authority’s ‘pay for slay’ policy", an op ed published by Jewish News Syndicate four days ago. It's authored by Maurice Hirsch who served in past years as director of the IDF Military Prosecution for Judea and Samaria. 

He's the kind of hands-on expert who can be expected to have some well-founded sense of what foreign aid funding achieves once it's handed over to the terror-addicted kleptocrats of the PA.

As it happens, Yossi Kuperwasser of the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, a former Director General of the Israel Ministry of Strategic Affairs and past head of the Research Division of IDF Military Intelligence, released a brief the same day as the Hirsch piece. It's called "Will the Palestinian Authority Stop Paying Terrorists? End the “Pay to Slay” Program?" and he leaves readers with the impression that no they won't. 

With predictable consequences.

22-Apr-20: Jerusalem: Pandemic or not, the terrorism goes on

Teddy Stadium, Jerusalem [Image Source]

We haven't done much blogging lately. No, we're not traveling. Nor are we dealing with back-to-back meetings as sometimes has happened in a previous era.

But in the current circumstances with a virus-borne plague turning life upside down everywhere, we've been distracted with the exigencies of life: staying indoors at home, worrying about family, taking care of food and supplies, protective items and hygiene aids. And engaging in numerous on-line meetings and webinars.

We're planning to do some catching up, starting now.

It's always clear to anyone watching that the practitioners of terror are generally motivated enough to keep at it even when their targets are pre-occupied. That's been made manifest here via two troubling reports.

Word emerged in the past hour of terrorist arrests made by Israeli security in March. As reported by Times of Israel ["Shin Bet says it arrested Palestinians planning bombing of Jerusalem stadium"] today, the suspects are accused of

planning to carry out terror attacks in Jerusalem and the West Bank, including a bombing in the capital’s Teddy Stadium, the Shin Bet security service says.... The three members of the terror cell — Ahmad Sajdaya, Muhammad Hammad, and Umar Eid — initially planned to construct a bomb and set it off in Teddy Stadium, performing reconnaissance operations and other preparations, before realizing that this would be too difficult to carry out due to the venue’s tight security. Instead, the trio planned to carry out bombing attacks on IDF troops in the West Bank and attempted a number of attacks last month... [They] also assisted in a number of attempted bombings against Israeli troops in recent years.

The Teddy Stadium, inaugurated in 1990 and named for long-time Jerusalem mayor Teddy Kolek, is owned by the Jerusalem municipality and has room for some 32,000 patrons. the largest sports stadium in the Middle East.

An updated report from Times of Israel adds these details:

• All three suspects were members of Kutla Islamiya, a university campus organization affiliated with the Islamist terrorists of Hamas.
• They got to know each when all three attended Birzeit University, located in Birzeit, near Ramallah, north of Jordan in an area controlled by the Palestinian Authority. Birzeit started life in 1924 as an elementary school for girls and acquired university status, while under Israeli control, in 1975.
• Sajdaya who is from Qalandiya has a history of involvement with explosive devices and lost part of a hand in a bomb preparation "accident" a few years ago.
• Eid, from Deir Jarir, holds an Israeli identity (blue) card. This helped him attend a soccer match at the Teddy Stadium a year ago. His goal was to gather intelligence with a view to blowing it up.
• Hammad, from the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Kafr Aqab, does not have permanent Israeli residency.

It's a developing story.

And earlier in the day [Wednesday] in Jerusalem again, a Palestinian Arab driving a van through a security crossing (commonly known as the Kiosk Checkpoint) east of Jerusalem near the city of Maale Adumim at about 8:00 am carried out a combined vehicle-ramming and stabbing attack. 

The attacker was eventually shot dead by armed Border Police forces after running down and hurting a twenty-year-old officer standing in the security checkpoint. The driver then leapt from his vehicle, brandishing a pair of scissors which he used to stab the already injured Israeli. This is captured in the security camera video above.

The as-yet unnamed Israeli is reported in moderate condition and recovering in hospital.

Times of Israel says a pipe-bomb was found in the attacker's possession, indicating advance planning (notwithstanding the use of scissors) and a desire to inflict more serious losses than running down an Israeli sceurity person would suggest.

In the Aljazeera version, the attacker is identified as Ibrahim Halsa, 25, from the village of Sawahra. If they're right, it's located on Jerusalem's south-eastern edge. Israel National News reports that a number of

"Arabs were injured in clashes in a-Sawahra village in the Jerusalem area, home of the Islamic operative who carried out the attack. Residents burned tires and IDF forces fired rubber bullets at them."

The late attacker's family, sad to relate, now become eligible under the Palestinian Authority's bizarre reward scheme ("Pay to Slay, it's commonly called) for the families of dead terrorists.
 

UPDATE 8:30 pm: And now reports of fires raging inside two of the several buildings that make up the Jerusalem City Hall complex. The Jerusalem Post says:

The fire began in the main building of the complex... Once the fire was detected emergency procedures were activated and police and firefighters were called to the scene. The cause of the fire is still unknown. Eight teams of firefighters are currently at work putting out the fire and searching for anyone who might be trapped in the building.
Police arrested a 40-year-old man for allegedly starting the fire. The man is reportedly a resident of East Jerusalem. Molotov cocktails were allegedly found at the scene, according to a Kan News report citing a City Hall official.

More when we know it.

04-Mar-19: Pre-dawn vehicle ramming attack on Israelis north of Ramallah

There has been yet another vehicle-ramming attack on Israelis this morning (Monday). According to a breaking Times of Israel report [here], a vehicle in which three persons were traveling was the weapon by which an attack was launched on Israeli security personnel before dawn today near an Arab village it names as N'ima.

Two injured Israelis were evacuated from the scene by helicopter and ambulance for emergency medical care at, we believe, Tel Hashomer Medical Center. One is said to be an IDF soldier whom it describes as being seriously inured. A member of the Border Guard (Mishmar Hagvul in Hebrew) is said to be lightly hurt.

Two of the attack-vehicle's three occupants are said to have been killing and a third wounded. The report quotes an IDF statement “from an initial investigation it appears to be a (terror) attack.”

A Hebrew-language social media report says the overnight attack at about 3:30 this morning in the Binyamin region was at Talmon/Dolev Junction which is about half way between the Israeli community of Dolev and an Arab village (of some 3,500 people) called Kafr Ni'ma (ניעמה) located about 13 km north-west of Ramallah. The less-injured service member is reported by first responders to be about 19. The more seriously-injured soldier is said, in an IDF statement [here], to be an officer. Haaretz says he's in his early twenties and in critical condition after being run-over. No names yet.

A Ynet report adds:

"The troops had stopped their vehicle at the roadside at night—Israeli media reported it had broken down—and were deliberately struck, the military said."

From the Palestinian Arab side, an Arabic language tweet at about 9:00 am Monday from the SAFA Palestinian Press Agency [here] quotes the PA's Ministry of Health about what it calls

"the martyrdom of two citizens and the wounding of a third after the occupation shot them near the village of Kafr Nehmeh west of the occupied West Bank city of Ramallah, and no information until the moment about the identity of the martyrs and the injured."

("Occupied" Ramallah is where the Fatah-controlled Palestinian Authority has its capital. Fatah and Hamas are deadly rivals. SAFA, based in the Gaza Strip, used to operate a Facebook page but this was shut down by Facebook about a year ago.)

13-Dec-18: On Jerusalem's Hagai Street in the Old City, another Arab-on-Israeli knifing attack this morning

Image Source: Haaretz

A little before a chilly dawn in Jerusalem's Old City today, a 26 year-old Palestinian Arab is caught by a security camera pushing a recognizably ultra-Orthodox man to the ground in Hagai Street, one of the pedestrian lanes running down the hill from the Damascus Gate (in Hebrew, Sha'ar Shechem).

That location is the favored entry point for observant Jews on their way to early morning prayers at the Kotel.

It has also become a popular site for recent Arab-on-Israeli knifings and is heavily patrolled. (Clich here for past Hagai Street attack reports.)

Times of Israel describes how the surveillance footage from the scene shows the attacker using a  knife to try to stab the worshiper. This does not work out, and an instant later [as the video shows] the assailant's attention is directed at two nearby Border Guard police. 

The male officer is (in the favored manner of Palestinian Arab knifing attacks) stabbed in the face, near his eye. The female border guard is stabbed in the leg. Ynet says she is 19, the male 21. The attacker was shot dead by the officers. His weapon was recovered at the scene.

Haaretz, quoting Arab sources, says the knifer's name is Majd Matir. He was a resident of the Qalandiya neighborhood on Jerusalem's north side.

The Arabic edition of the European-financed Ma'an News Agency (but not the English) names him as Majed Jamal Mutair, 25, and in traditional terror-incitement fashion calls him a martyr.

11-Dec-18: Near Hevron, another thwarted Arab-on-Israeli vehicle ramming

Idhna [Wikipedia]

The hunt for the drive-by shooters in the attack we reported on Sunday ["09-Dec-18: A shooter in a passing vehicle seriously injures several Israelis tonight near Ofra, north of Jerusalem"] goes on. Meanwhile there are fresh reports today of similar Arab-on-Israel violence.

In the less dramatic of two Tuesday reports, a Palestinian Arab driver in a village called al-Jiftlik, 33 km north of Jericho in Israel's northern Jordan Valley, drive directly at officers of the Border Guards who were securing the work of Civil Administration personnel engaged in demolishing illegally-constructed buildings. The village is part of Area C, meaning it is subject to full Israeli military and civil administration. The driver, a 30-year-old male from the village

allegedly accelerated his car toward a group of Border Police officers. The troops fired warning shots into the air, and the suspect stopped and was arrested, police said... He was handed over to the Shin Bet security service for further questioning [source]

In a separate incident, Times of Israel says a Palestinian Arab driver was shot dead by Border Police mid-morning today (Tuesday) in Idhna, an Arab town of about 20,000 people, located 13 km west of Hevron with an out-of-the-ordinary background.

The circumstances point to a failed vehicle-ramming attack:

The Border Police officers... were standing guard as members of the Defense Ministry’s Civil Administration, which oversees day-to-day activities in the West Bank, were taking part in an effort to crack down on the illegal burning of garbage. According to police, the Palestinian suspect drove through a checkpoint the border guards had set up, hit a security vehicle with his car and then “accelerated toward a Border Police officer.” The border guards opened fire at the vehicle, fatally wounding the suspect... No Israeli troops were injured.

The driver was later identified by the Palestinian Arab Red Crescent authorities as Omar Hassan al-Awawdeh, 27.

An Iranian news source frames today's events in ways that will be familiar to consumers of Israel-bashing reports:

The Israeli military regularly opens fatal fire on Palestinians, accusing them of seeking to attack its personnel. Human rights groups have repeatedly slammed the Tel Aviv (sic) regime for its shoot-to-kill policy as a large number of the Palestinians killed at the scene of attacks did not pose any serious threat to Israelis.

A December 2017 Aljazeera report from Idhna where today's
thwarted attack took place [Source]

In the wake of the thwarted vehicle-ramming, we have yet to see any Arab media attention on what Times of Israel noted - that what brought the Israeli police into the town today was "an effort to crack down on the illegal burning of garbage".

Sounds prosaic. But it turns out to be a classic instance of the Israeli authorities trying to prevent the Palestinian Arabs from doing even more harm to themselves and their own backyards.

Idhna was once a thriving agricultural town. Today, it's notorious for being one of the most polluted places in the region. The environmental damage the residents have done to their land is massive and lethal, much of it resulting from the illegal burning - in order to extract resalable components, especially metals - of televisions, fridges, computers, air-conditioners and other appliances. The result is massively large and damaging levels of heavy metals, especially cadmium and lead, damaging crops and aquifers and making life hazardous

Almost exactly a year ago, Aljazeera gave it some attention in a video report: "Palestine's Idhna struggles with e-waste". Though the word 'dumping' is used, it's evidently the town's people who go out looking for the dangerous and the toxic because that's where the money is.

A quick survey of Arabic-language news media shows that the shot driver is invariably called a "martyr", with zero mentions of why the Israeli police where there, of the thwarted ramming [Al-Madinah; Al-Fajr; Ad-Dustour (Jordan); Safa; Panorama] or of the crushing pollution.

27-Apr-18: On Jerusalem's southern edge, an overnight intercept appears to have thwarted an armed terror attack

The intercepted vehicle at the security checkpoint in southern
Jerusalem [Image Source: Israel Police]

We have little patience for critics of Israel who object to security checkpoints that inconvenience those going about their peaceful business. The problem with the objection, naturally enough, is that not everyone going about their business is peaceful.

This is especially - and importantly - true of the entrances to Israel's populated areas. Places like Jerusalem, the capital.

On Jerusalem's southern edge, in the general area of suburban Gilo and Malcha and the nearby Israeli community of Har Gilo, close to Jerusalem's famous Biblical Zoo and more or less on the outer edges of Bethlehem, there's a security checkpoint we know as Ein Yael, with a gorgeous public nature reserve and ancient historical site, the Ein Haniya natural spring and a hands-on museum for children. (Haaretz wrote about developments there in the past few weeks.)

B'Tselem, a far-left Israeli group, that deals in human rights violations, publishes an on-listing ["Checkpoints in the West Bank and Gaza"] which catalogues what you would expect from the name. Here's how it describes the checkpoint:

al-Walajah / Malha / ‘Ein Yalu
Permanently staffed Last checkpoint before Israel
Located on the Green Line. Staffed around the clock by the military, Border Police, and private security companies. Closed to Palestinians, with the exception of East Jerusalem residents.

In the very early hours of this morning (Friday), a little after 1:00 am according to this Hebrew social media report, members of the Israeli Border Guard (Mishmar Hagvul - the border security branch of the national police) did exactly what security personnel are supposed to do when everything works right: they spotted what they called a "suspicious" vehicle en route to Jerusalem right at the crossing. This one had yellow Israeli license plates, and on closer inspection was found to be driven by a pair of Palestinian Arabs who we now know are residents of Hebron and nearby Beit Jala.

Times of Israel says

Security forces arrested two West Bank Palestinians who tried to enter Israel with a pipe bomb Thursday night, police said. A statement from police said the “suspicious” vehicle carrying the Palestinians was stopped at the Ein Yael checkpoint in southern Jerusalem. A search of the vehicle yielded the homemade explosive device, a knife, and tens of thousands of shekels in cash and checks, it said. An army sapper was called to the scene to defuse the pipe bomb. The suspects were detained for questioning.

Israel National News, quoting  an Israel Police statement said

"Border Police soldiers and police officers are deployed around the clock in the Jerusalem area to locate and inspect vehicles and suspects in order to protect the lives of Israeli citizens."

The suspects have now been taken for interrogation. Neither they nor their weapons of war would have been intercepted if the checkpoint were not there (and they knew it was so they took an unsuccessful calculated risk) and the security personnel were less alert.

10-Feb-18: Two more Arab-on-Israeli stabbing attacks thwarted; both perpetrators are just 15

Totally unrelated to today's report, this product of the UN-operated
UNRWA school system has learned valuable skills involving household
tools which many of his age-mates have applied - under the influence
of inspiration from multiple levels of their society - to their daily lives 

Just yesterday, we posted ["09-Feb-18: At the Tomb of Patriarchs, yet another thwarted Arab-on-Israeli stabbing attack"] about what we called the sixth thwarted attack in and around the ancient and sacred Tomb of the Patriarchs in Hebron during the past two months.

Today there's yet another. Times of Israel reported around 4:00 pm this afternoon:

For the second day in a row, Border Police arrested a Palestinian suspect in the West Bank city of Hebron on Saturday, after finding a knife hidden under his clothes at the entrance to the Tomb of the Patriarchs holy site. After the 15-year-old boy set off the metal detector at a checkpoint outside the holy site, officers cocked their weapons at him and asked him to slowly raise his shirt. Upon recognizing the knife underneath, security forces detained the teen and took him in for additional questioning... ["Palestinian stopped outside Hebron holy site with knife", Jacob Magid in Times of Israel, February 10, 2018]

Times of Israel reports that in a separate thwarted attack yesterday (Friday), Israeli security forces arrested another armed Palestinian teenager at the entrance to the West Bank community of Hashmona'im, located just off Route 443 and a short stroll away from the city of Modi'in.

The 15 year-old from Bil'in had this knife on his body when arrested
at the entrance to Hashmona'im on Friday

Service personnel from the Border Guard (Mishmar Hagvul) police were alerted and ordered the suspect to stop. He ignored their command and was soon overpowered, arrested, searched and taken into custody. The would-be attacker, a resident of nearby Bil'in, was found to be armed with a knife. No one was injured though it's apparent to any intelligent observer that this, like today's attack, could easily have ended very differently.

With its easy access - located near major highways and half-way between Jerusalem and Tel Aviv, Bi'in is host to an ongoing media-focused cottage industry of holding weekly "protests" to which members of the reporting industry have made their way on Friiday's throughout the past thirteen years [see Al Jazeera for background]

The underlying story, which is egregiously ignored by the mainstream media, is the way fifteen year-old Palestinian Arab children are front-line troops on behalf of the Palestinian Arab cause, having undergone a relentless and ongoing process of weaponization in their schools, social media and mosques.

09-Feb-18: At the Tomb of Patriarchs, yet another thwarted Arab-on-Israeli stabbing attack

Video capture [Source: YouTube] shows the checkpoint where the
alertness and cool-heads of the personnel prevented an awful outcome

It's a gorgeous early-Spring day here but the miserable problems of living side-by-side with significant numbers of violent and extremist neighbors are still with us.

Around noon today (Friday) for at least the sixth time in two months, another Palestinian Arab armed with a knife was apprehended by service personnel of the Border guard police as he attempted to enter the sacred Tomb of the Patriarchs complex with a concealed knife - in his case, a kitchen knife tucked into one of his socks.

According to Israel National News, the security people at the checkpoint

noticed that the 23-year-old Arab arriving at the site was behaving oddly, and asked him to walk through a metal detector. After the metal detector beeped a few times, the officers found a large kitchen knife hidden in one of the Arab's socks. Following an initial investigation, Border Police estimate that the Arab planned to carry out a stabbing attack at the Cave of the Patriarchs. The suspect has been taken for questioning.

Via Hebrew-language social media, it's noted that the thwarted attacker is a resident of Hebron.

23-Jan-18: Arab-on-Israeli stabbing attack at Tapuah Junction

Uploaded to social media from the scene of
the thwarted attack [Image Source]

There are initial reports via the Hebrew-language social media that there has been an Arab-on-Israeli stabbing in the past few minutes (it's now 1:25 pm Tuesday) at Tapuah Junction. The location has been the scene of many previous violent acts of terror (click "Tapuah" to see our previous posts).

The first indications are that two attackers were involved, and that they were stopped - by means of either IDF or Israeli security personnel gunfire to the lower parts of their bodies - from inflicting injuries on their intended victims. Both are alive and in custody.

An initial bulletin via Ynet says:

They were neutralized by Border Policemen who were on the scene. One was shot and wounded, the other was overpowered and apprehended without the use of fire.

The attackers meant to cause serious harm to Israelis (any Israelis - everyone knows how terror works) and failed. To those who stopped them, well done!

More details when we get them.

23-Jan-18: A would-be-stabber, a knife, an ancient and sacred religious site... again

Our previous post went up Sunday ["21-Jan-18: Friday's terror and the lens of history"] and reports on three Arab-on-Israeli terror attacks from Friday, one of which was directed at the ancient and sacred Tomb of the Patriarchs in Hevron.

Well, this morning we have another at that same site. From Times of Israel last night (Monday):

Palestinian man caught trying to enter Hebron holy site with knife
Jacob Magid | 22 January 2018, 9:05 pm  0
Border Police arrested a Palestinian man in the West Bank city of Hebron on Monday, after finding a knife hidden under his clothes at the entrance to the Tomb of the Patriarchs holy site. Officers asked the man, in his 30s, to walk through a metal detector upon his arrival at the checkpoint. While the device did not sound an alarm, the statement from Border Police said the security forces still suspected the Palestinian and conducted a full body search. “An initial investigation revealed that the suspect was apparently intending to carry out a stabbing attack,” Border Police said. The Palestinian, said to be from the nearby village of Dura, was detained and transferred for questioning. “Beyond the technological means at the disposal of the soldiers in their missions, there is no substitute for the professionalism and alertness of the fighters, who once again managed to prevent an attack and thereby save lives,” the Border Police statement concluded. The Tomb of the Patriarchs is a frequent target for stabbing attacks.

Dura is a town of some 30,000 Arabs, located roughly 10 km south of Hevron. It has gotten mentioned in many of our blog reports of terror attacks.

20-Dec-17: The Tomb of the Patriarchs: Another would-be stabber is intercepted in time

Image Source: Haaretz

A Palestinian Arab armed with a knife was stopped today (Wednesday afternoon) around 4:00 pm at one of the security checkpoints that surround the ancient and sacred Tomb of the Patriarchs in Hebron. He was promptly arrested.

The would-be stabber from the Arab town of Dahariya, 23 kilometers south of Hebron, aroused the suspicions of the Border Guard officers stationed at the checkpoint. They demanded he submit to a metal detector examination. It found a metal object hidden on his body.

The suspect then mysteriously declined a request by the officers to empty his pockets after the metal detector found what it found, and preferred instead to pull out and brandish the knife. The Border Guard men brought their powers of persuasion into play and convinced the Palestinian Arab man - by means of their quickly-raised weapons and well-focused words - to surrender before he was able to stab anyone.

The men with the guns could have killed him on the spot but chose instead to take him custody. No one was injured.

Under preliminary questioning, according to Israel National News, the gentleman under arrest agreed with his interrogators that he had come with his knife to "to carry out a terrorist attack against the officers".

UNESCO decided by a vote in July that the Tomb of the Patriarchs is a "Palestinian heritage site". Haaretz reported at the time that 12 states on its World Heritage Committee voted for the resolution and three voted against. The vote also recognized the site "as being in danger, meaning that each year UNESCO's World Heritage Committee will convene to discuss" its case.

It would be nice to think the UNESCO concern stemmed from the long line of stabbers and would-be stabbers who have targeted the ancient site for their murderous purposes. But our impression is they have not the slightest interest in Palestinian Arab violence and their influence on sites of cultural significance.

17-Dec-17: Two Arab-on-Israeli terror attacks; both involve bombs

The heavily secured entrance to the Samaria Military Court where this
morning's attack was thwarted [Archive Image Source]

Far from the attention of the army of foreign reporters prowling our country for stories, Israeli alertness has thwarted a couple of especially hair-raising attacks by Palestinian Arab zealots intent on murder at any price, including their own lives. Both incidents involve bombs.

First this morning (Sunday). Times of Israel's account ["Palestinian arrested outside West Bank military court with suspected bomb", today] says a Palestinian Arab, still unidentified at this early stage, tried to make his way into one of Israel's military courts while wearing some prohibited underwear. 

He was stopped by on-duty Border Guard officers on arriving at the entrance to the Samaria Military Court (we think the one in Salim, in Israel's Jezreel Valley) with what appears - no one is certain yet - a bomb strapped to his body. It's a gorgeous early winter day, not cold, very sunny, and he was wearing an overcoat. One of the police required him to remove the coat, and the murderous thing concealed inside it it became evident.

Sappers are working to defuse the suspected explosive device as we write this. The court's entrance is now closed.

Notwithstanding those vague media reports appearing from time to time that Palestinian Arab terrorists have discontinued their fixation with body-mounted bombs and other forms of murderous self-immolation, a social media commentator posted this morning (in Hebrew) that there have been at least two very similar previous attacks by bombers this year, one on May 24 and one of October 15 (reported here), at the very same location.

Two days ago (Friday), a Palestinian Arab in another attack involving the Border Guard part of Israel's police, this time in the Arab town of Al-Bireh (population around 40,000), ran full-pelt towards the Israelis while brandishing a knife. As well armed as the police undoubtedly were, they held off doing the obvious - firing at the man with the very clear intentions - until he was upon them. He managed to stab one of the Israeli Border Guard men in the upper part of his body. 

Image Source: NYPost/AFP

He was wearing what the media are calling "a suicide vest". It's not clear whether the "suicide" device involved actual explosives or the mere appearance of them. Colleagues of the stabbed police officer, fearing he would explode and caused still more injuries, shot him. (It's captured on a graphic piece of video here.) He is now dead.

The Palestinian Authority health ministry, often the source for details about terrorists and their injuries, says the deceased attacker is named Mohammed Aqal, 29. 

As the AFP photo above makes plain, whether or not the knife-man had a working bomb under his jacket, he plainly wanted people to think he did. He also, it appears, wanted to seem to be a reporter according to this stunning article ["Police: Palestinian who stabbed border guard pretended to be a journalist", Times of Israel, today]

His injured victim is now in Jerusalem's Shaarei Zedek Medical Center where the official report issued this morning (Sunday) is, according to Ynet, that his condition is thankfully improving and he is now said to be in moderate condition.

26-Sep-17: At Har Adar's entrance, an Arab-on-Israeli shooter with problems and a solution

The aftermath of today's killings outside Har Adar [Image Source: AFP]

Around 7:15 this morning (Tuesday), at the entrance to the north Jerusalem suburban community of Har Adar, a gunman - part of a milling crowd of Palestinian Arab laborers waiting to be allowed through the security check to start their day's work - opened fire on the Border Guard men at the barrier.

Three were killed, a fourth was critically injured and is fighting for his life at this hour in a Jerusalem hospital. The gunman was shot dead.

Times of Israel names the three murdered young Israeli men:

• Border Guard staff sergeant Solomon Gavriyah, 20, from Be’er Yaakov. He did his mandatory national service with the Border Guard and then continued with them, doing police work in the Jerusalem seam area along the 1947 armistice line that outsiders often refer to misleadingly as a border. He was lightly injured in the hand during a terror stabbing in the area a year ago. His funeral is now set for 5 pm today in Be’er Yaakov's military cemetery. His parents, two sisters and a brother survive him.
• Civilian security guard Youssef Ottman, 25, from the nearby Israel Arab town of Abu Ghosh. He will be buried there later today. Ottman is described as “a quiet guy who got along with everyone”, and the son of an established and successful family. He is survived by parents and siblings, including a sister who was married last week.
• Civilian security guard Or Arish, 25, from the Har Adar community itself. His funeral is at 4:30 this afternoon at Jerusalem's main cemetery in  Givat Shaul.

The fourth victim, not yet publicly named, is the community security officer for Har Adar, a man of 33. He underwent emergency surgery at Hadassah Medical Center hospital in Ein Kerem, Jerusalem from where his condition is described as stable and moderate.

Today's murdered Israelis (left to right): Arish, Gvariyah, Ottman
[Image Source]

The terrorist is identified [here] as Nimer Mahmoud Ahmad Jamal, a laborer with a history of family violence, from nearby Bayt Surik, an Arab village of about 4,000 residents. (Here's something we wrote some months ago about one of his nearby neighbours: "14-Dec-16: In Jerusalem's Old City this afternoon, an Arab-on-Israeli stabbing").

The troubles in his private life notwithstanding, the Shin Bet, Israel's domestic security service, says he had no known background in terrorist activities. A father of four, he held a legal work permit making him one of few Palestinian Arabs holding such privileges to have committed a terror attack in recent years.

In its report on the terrorist killings, the New York Times today says the killer was well known in Har Adar. He was expected at the home of a member of the local council this morning where he had some work to do - cleaning work, according to Israel National News. NYT quotes residents of Har Adar telling Israel’s Galei Zahal Army Radio this morning that the attacker had had "personal problems", with his wife recently leaving him and going off to Jordan. Other sources mention she left the children behind with him. There's no word yet on where they are or who is caring for them. It clearly won't be their father.

One Har Adar resident quoted by Israel National News says

the terrorist was one of many PA workers who enter the town for work on a regular basis. “Every day, dozens of workers enter the community through the back gate. Some work inside the community in construction and housework for families, and others work on the outskirts. They undergo an inspection and body search, and there are good relations between the residents of Har Adar and the workers,” she said. “We know the terrorist, he worked as a cleaner at several houses in the community,” she added. “It’s scary to think what would have happened if he had succeeded in passing the checkpoint and gotten to the school that is several meters away, or to one of the houses nearby.”

The killer himself let those closest to him know what was coming:

In his final message to his wife, which was released after the attack by the Israeli army, Jamal, who had worked for years as a house cleaner in Har Adar, mourned her departure and said he had been a terrible husband to her. “When you wake up in the morning, share this message on my page. Let your conscience rest. You were a good wife, Umm Baha [mother of Baha], and a compassionate mother and I was the one who behaved badly,” he wrote... “I say this in full awareness: my wife had nothing to do with what will happen tomorrow.” ["Wife of Har Adar terrorist left him weeks before shooting", Times of Israel, September 26, 2017]

Though we can speculate, we don't really know what the dead shooter's problems were. But if all or some of them were economic, he and the loathsome PA leadership under president-for-life Mahmoud Abbas have just solved them. 

As Palestinian Media Watch observes in a bulletin a few hours ago and as we have written extensively (click "Rewards for Terror" to view dozens of our posts on this painful subject), the Palestinian Authority pays salaries to terrorists and to families of dead attackers - "martyrs" in their terminology - as part of an incentive scheme that ensures the blood keeps flowing.

According to PA regulations, the murderer's family will immediately receive a 6,000 shekel grant and an additional 2,600 shekels each month for life, based on the following formula:  

• 1,400 shekels each month - base allowance;
• 400 shekels additional each month for each wife;
• 200 shekels additional each month for each child.

This terrorist had one wife and four children so his family will receive 2,600 shekel every month for life.

The PA is perpetually broke, and always will be as long as there are foreign aid providers ready to respond to their malevolent pan-handling. The notorious PA Rewards for Terror scheme can only continue because of the willingness of the providers of foreign aid to pretend not to know about the payments scheme and its enabling role in the despicable culture of death the Abbas regime, and Arafat before him, stitched together to ensure the perpetuation of their people's misery and a steady stream of martyrs' funerals.

17-Jul-17: Two images: Do the things that offend people say something about them?

Two photos here.

The first represents a cause around which large swathes of Palestinian Arabs and citizens of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, including most of the members of its parliament, have rallied.

Are those Arab populations offended? They certainly are.

The photo shows new enhanced security devices that were installed on the approaches to the Temple Mount in Jerusalem following Friday's lethal shooting attack by three Arab gunmen from the northern Israeli city of Um Al-Fahm.

They attackers managed to kill two Israeli Border Guard security men, both of them from Israel's Druze minority, who were protecting the Moslem holy sites. Scanning and detecting devices just like these have been used to screen every visitor to the nearby Kotel for years. Those visitors are not all Jews, but it's a site holy to the Jews and Jews are a very large of the crowds that throng the Kotel plaza.

Muslims heading for the Temple Mount have had the privilege of being exempt from security measures like these till now. This change evidently offends them deeply even as it will almost certainly enhance their safety and ours.

The second shows the funeral of the two victims of that shooting attack.

Haiel Sitawe, 30, from Maghar, a mostly Druze and Arab city in northern Israel, who signed up with the Border Police as part of his mandatory national service in 2012 and served in the unit responsible for securing the Temple Mount ever since; and Kamil Shnaan, 22, from Hurfeish, an almost entirely-Druze village also in Israel's north. Sitawe is survived by a wife, Irin, and a three-week-old son, as well as parents and three brothers. Shnaan was to celebrate his engagement party to his girlfriend in a week. He leaves behind parents, a brother and three sisters.

The deaths by shooting of the two men whose self-endangering presence was meant to protect the Al-Aqsa precinct and its worshipers from terrorist attack has aroused no expressions of their honor offended - not from Jordan (see our post from yesterday: "16-Jul-17: The Friday killings: Jordan condemns but pay attention whom") and not in any meaningful way from the Palestinian Arabs.

It's almost as if they want attacks like this to happen.

05-Jul-17: At a security checkpoint near Jerusalem, alert personnel thwart terror attack

The gang members meditate on their actions
in Israeli custody after the intercept
[Image Source: Social Media]

People who like the idea that terrorist attacks against Israelis have receded into the past are advised to stop reading now and go to another page:

Terror attack in Jerusalem foiled | Border police arrest 6 suspects attempting to enter Jerusalem with explosives and knives | Border police units and police arrest 6 suspects in a vehicle at the Mizmorah crossing, one of the crossings in the outskirts of Jerusalem. The suspects from Nablus attempted to make their way into Jerusalem and were stopped at the crossing before entering. The vehicle was searched and a bag was found containing knives, stun grenades and Molotov cocktails, including flammable materials. The crossing was closed and a bomb disposal expert was called in the area to secure the scene. All of the suspects were transferred to the Border Police units for questioning. The units prevented an attack from taking place and police and border police operations continue in all areas. ["Terror attack in Jerusalem foiled", Israel National News, July 4, 2017]

(We would spell the name of the checkpoint Mizmoriah - מחסום מזמוריה. It's adjacent to the thriving Jerusalem neighbourhood of Har Homa on Jerusalem's south side.)

Thank goodness for Israel's security checkpoints and alert security personnel.

01-Apr-17: Jerusalem's Old City: A Sabbath afternoon stabbing attack

The visibly-wounded Israeli victims of the stabbing,
shown in a video clip posted to Arabic media. 

Another Arab-on-Israeli stabbing in Jerusalem's Old City.

Based on a 4:15 pm Israel Police statement, two young Israeli men, dressed in identifiably Haredi clothing, evidently yeshiva students, were attacked on Hagai Street by a male Arab armed with a knife and suffered stab wounds to the upper parts of their bodies. From images posted to social media sites, at least one of the Israelis was stabbed from behind in the back between the shoulder blades.

The attacker, pursued by members of the Israeli security forces, ducked into a home near the Ateret Cohanim Yeshiva to try to evade them. They caught up with him and a struggle ensued in which one of the Israelis, an officer in the Border Police, was seriously injured. The knifer was then shot and killed.

Israelis came under rock-throwing attack shortly afterwards in the vicinity of the Old City's heavily-secured Damascus Gate (Sha'ar Shechem in Hebrew). Stun grenades were reportedly used to neutralize those attackers. Another Arab-on-Israeli stabbing attack was foiled at Damascus Gate this past Wednesday.

The civilian victims of this afternoon's stabbing, males aged 18 and 20 (they're in the photo above), were taken to the hospital emergency room at Hadassah Ein Karem for emergency treatment and are reported to be in good condition and fully conscious. The Border Guard officer, in his early twenties, is recovering in hospital, and also said to be in good condition.

In the plaza outside Jerusalem's Damascus Gate this afternoon,
rock throwing and clashes [Image Source]

The attacker is reported, according to the PA's Ministry of Health, to be a 17 year-old Arab male, Ahmad Zahir Fathi Ghazal from the Nablus area which is some 50 km north of Jerusalem. Arabic-language Posters celebrating his deed [here] were quickly posted to social media, along with a pre-martyrdom selfie [via Twitter] he evidently took earlier in the day and shortly before embarking on the knife attacks showing him standing on the Temple Mount with the Dome of the Rock in the background.

In its Arabic version of the news report, but not in the English, the Ma'an News Agency, a notorious and controversial Palestinian Arab publisher, describes the attacker as "martyr" and his death as an execution by the Israelis. This is a fairly standard approach in their reporting of Arab-on-Israeli terrorist attacks.

We have no details of his family's reaction but know, on the basis of what has been published over the past several years about the Palestinian Authority's Rewards for Terror scheme (known also as Pay-to-Slay), that they now become entitled to substantial payments from the PA. As we noted recently, the relatives of the Palestinian Arab stabber who killed an American visitor to Tel Aviv, Taylor Force, a year ago now receive monthly payments equal to several times the average Palestinian wage.

Despite the PA's constant denials, the funding for this scheme and the fat payments it makes to terrorists and their families is made possible only because of the generosity of Western governments and via the polite blind eye they turn to this unconscionable abuse of foreign aid.

There are more details and background in our recent blog post: "28-Mar-17: The US can end the Palestinian Arab bureaucracy of terror".

07-Oct-16: In the aftermath of an Arab-on-Israeli knifing

The young Arab who carried out the stabbing attack holds Israeli
identification papers [Image Source]

Some two and a half weeks ago, we wrote here about one of those fairly ordinary terror attacks that keep getting brief mentions in the Israeli news media and - usually - no coverage or very little in the non-Israeli media.

There continues to be serious violence in the air. Two officers of the Border Guard service (Mishmar Hagvul in Hebrew) were seriously injured when attacked from behind by a man wielding a knife on the street outside Jerusalem's Old City around 7:00 this (Monday) morning. Times of Israel says one of the Israeli victims, a female officer of about 38, is in intensive care at Shaarei Zedek Medical Center hospital with stab wounds to the neck. (We have noted before that attacking the neck is standard Arab-on-Israeli practice in the Palestinian Arab terror manual.) She is unconscious and was placed on a respirator... Their attacker was shot and is now receiving treatment in a Jerusalem hospital where the latest report is that he's in critical condition. The initial reports we have seen say he is in his early 20s and from the Ras al-Amud neighbourhood of East Jerusalem. In a later Times of Israel report, the knifer is identified as Ayman al-Kurd... [T]he attack took place on the road outside two of Jerusalem's medieval gates: Damascus Gate and Herod’s (or Flower) Gate. The Israeli victims were on security patrol... ["19-Sep-16: Outside Jerusalem's Old City, a Monday morning Arab-on-Israeli terror attack"]

We ourselves are familiar with how news reporting interest waxes sharply (if at all) and then wanes as the broken glass is swept away, the victims are assumed to be in the care of their families or doctors or emergency room teams, and the perpetrators spend the rest of their lives behind bars. 

We're also familiar with how unfactual summaries like that often are.

Here's today's update on the Border Guard officer - still un-named in Israeli news reports - who was attacked by a knife-wielding Palestinian Arab while she was on foot patrol securing the busy streets outside Jerusalem's Old City precinct:

A female police officer who was severely injured in a terror attack in September has shown promising signs of improvement. The 38-year old officer was stabbed by an Arab terrorist near Herod’s Gate of the Old City of Jerusalem on September 19th. Her patrol partner was also stabbed, but managed to draw his weapon and shoot and neutralize the attacker. On Thursday, Shaarei Tzedek Hospital in Jerusalem released a statement detailing the terror victim’s improvements, noting that she was now breathing unassisted and is able to communicate with those around her. But, hospital officials added, the victim is still suffering from neurological damage caused by injuries to her spinal cord suffered during the stabbing. She remains in the intensive care unit... [Israel National News, October 6, 2016]

There's much more to be found on-line about the Arab attacker.

An Israeli magistrate court extended on Thursday the detention of a Palestinian who was critically injured while carrying out a stabbing attack on Israeli security forces in occupied East Jerusalem earlier this month. Ayman al-Kurd, a 20-year-old resident of the Ras al-Amoud neighborhood of East Jerusalem, stabbed and wounded two Israeli police officers on Sept. 19 just north of the Old City. His detention has been extended to Oct. 5, according to Palestinian Committee of Prisoners’ Affairs lawyer Muhammad Mahmoud, who recently met with al-Kurd. One of the officers shot and critically injured al-Kurd on the scene, causing hemiparesis -- weakness on one side of the body -- Mahmoud said, adding that al-Kurd was still being treated at the Hadassa Ein Karem hospital in Jerusalem... [Ma'an News Agency: "Israel extends detention of Palestinian critically injured after carrying out Jerusalem stabbing", September 29, 2016]

(Click here for more reports of a similar, "resistance"-centric nature about the same knife-man and what he did. Reports on the horrific injuries suffered by the Israeli woman are nowhere to be found, other than in what we quoted above.)

Being treated in one of the best hospitals in the Middle East will undoubtedly improve the young stabber's chances of making a full recovery from those gun shots that slowed down and then stopped his cowardly attack-from-behind.

But that's not what Arabic-reading news consumers are being told. In their way of telling things, the victims, naturally enough, are the Arabs including - especially - the knife-man who, says the Fatah mouthpiece, was unarmed when shot by the Israelis:

"The Jerusalem branch of the Fatah Movement emphasized in its statement today, Monday [Sept. 19, 2016], that the occupation forces are targeting the blood of the Palestinians and doing as they please with it in an intentional and direct manner, which is something that will have serious consequences. The statement comes after the summary executions and daily killing that the [Israeli] security forces have carried out against unarmed Palestinians (i.e., terrorists attacking with knives or in car ramming attacks), as seven citizens were executed within a week on pretexts and empty excuses, the last of which was the targeting of young Ayman Al-Kurd (i.e., terrorist, who wounded 2) this morning. Fatah Movement Secretary in Jerusalem Adnan Ghaith said that our Palestinian people has turned into a direct target for summary executions and cold-blooded murder for the occupation forces, who carry out crimes before the eyes and ears of the entire world, without anyone acting to stop these racist crimes." [As reported by WAFA, the PA's official news agency, on the day of the attack, September 19, 2016, cited by Palestinian Media Watch]

What chance that Palestinian Arab society will ever engage in the introspection needed to comprehend, and then end, attacks like the one executed by Al-Kurd, when everyone in his circle is told he was an unarmed, innocent victim of systematic Israeli blood-letting?

Ah, but that is precisely the outcome desired by the Palestinian Authority and its ruling clique.

A Facebook page headlined "I am a Palestinian. I am not a terrorist" provides a sympathetic English-language portrait of the terrorist, and includes a photograph of the Israeli-government-issued ID card [here] we posted at the top of the page. As an Israeli, it's likely he will continue to be entitled to Israeli Social Security (Bituach Leumi) benefits as he continues to recover from being shot by police.

18-Sep-16: This afternoon's thwarted Arab-on-Israeli terror attacker is 12 years old

Children from the UNRWA camp where today's pre-teen attacker was
being educated and raised [Image Source: UN Photo/Stephenie Hollyman]

The day's violence has not yet subsided.

A Palestinian Arab boy was apprehended by a Border Guard patrol this afternoon. In his possession, he had two firebombs (also known as Molotov Cocktails) and a knife. He aroused suspicion when the security people noticed him watching them at a base in the Jordan Valley.

According to Ynet, the Border Guard people believe he was in the process of carrying out an attack against members of their force. He's said to be a a resident of Aqabat Jaber, a small refugee camp for Palestinian Arabs on the outskirts of Jericho, operated by UNRWA. He's currently being interrogated.

In reporting the thwarted attack, Times of Israel notes that the Border Guard base happens to be located adjacent to the Jewish community of Vered Yericho ("Rose of Jericho"), a moshav that is home to 285 residents. The attacker is believed to be just 12 years old, and confessed to the attack he was hoping to carry out.

As we have noted here several times, UNRWA plays an oversize role in preparing Palestinian Arab children for being weaponized and to embrace death. (For instance, see "30-May-16: Listen to the children to understand who is weaponizing them and how [Video]".) It's endlessly astonishing to us that so much harm can be done by an organization whose multi-billion dollar budget is overwhelmingly supplied by unsuspecting taxpayers in European countries, along with Australia and the United States. UNRWA is a decades-long scandal the true price of which is measured in young lives needlessly wasted and lost. How do its leaders sleep at night?