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An Israeli soldier was seriously wounded on Tuesday at a West Bank gas station in what has been ruled a Palestinian car-ramming attack, the Israel Defense Forces announced.
The terror attack took place around 10:45 AM on Route 60, adjacent to the town of Kochav Yaakov, just north of Jerusalem. CCTV footage of the incident showed a black SUV with Palestinian license plates making a turn after spotting the soldier walking from a parking lot to a sidewalk. The vehicle rammed into the woman before fleeing the scene.
The IDF asked the public not to spread the video of the attack any further.
Magen David Adom paramedics stated they treated the victim, a woman in her early twenties, and transported her to Jerusalem’s Shaare Zedek Medical Center with a serious head injury. The hospital said her condition was stable.
The terrorist, identified as 45-year-old Rani Mamoun Fayz Abu Ali from the village of Beitunia, was shot dead by police officers after a brief chase. Local media noted that he had a valid permit to enter Israeli communities in Judea and Samaria, and reportedly worked at a supermarket in Ariel.
Tuesday’s attack came as tensions remain high in the area. This week, citing Military Intelligence assessments, the IDF revealed that its ongoing anti-terror raids on Palestinian cities and towns had foiled some 500 attacks in the past year.
According to IDF data, troops arrested more than 2,500 suspects in the West Bank following a series of deadly attacks that started in late March. These attacks have left 31 people in Israel and the West Bank dead, the overwhelming majority being civilians.
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The US-designated Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) terrorist organization this week threatened to assassinate Israel’s incoming National Security minister, Otzma Yehudit (Jewish Power) party leader Itamar Ben-Gvir.
“The fate of Ben-Gvir will become like that of the mortal minister of tourism of the occupation, Rehavam Ze’evi,” PIJ spokesperson Tariq Izz al-Din stated in a communique. Ze’evi was shot in 2001 in Jerusalem by terrorists from the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) and died of his injuries.
Palestinian Islamic Jihad spokesperson in the West Bank, Tariq Izz al-Din, stated today that Israeli right wing leader Itmar Ben-Givr will meet the same fate as Rehavam Ze'evi who was assassinated in 2001 by PFLP militants. pic.twitter.com/a96hCe2w1q
— Joe Truzman (@JoeTruzman) November 28, 2022
Ben-Gvir — a firebrand right-wing lawmaker who is expected to assume the newly created position of national security minister in prime minister-designate Benjamin Netanyahu’s incoming government — stated in response that PIJ’s threat “will not deter me.”
“We are committed to restoring security to Israel’s citizens,” he said, while calling on his coalition partners to finalize negotiations in order to “crush” the threat emanating from Islamic Jihad.
Ben Gvir has faced death threats from Palestinian terror groups several other times over the past year, with the Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) announcing in May that it foiled a plot by Hamas to assassinate him.
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Outgoing Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid sent a missive to more than 50 countries asking them to use their influence on the Palestinian leadership to thwart a UN initiative asking the International Court of Justice (ICJ) for a legal opinion on the status of Israel’s “occupation.”
“This decision is the result of an orchestrated effort to discriminate against Israel, to call into question our legitimate security concerns, and to deny the legitimacy of our very existence,” Lapid explained in the letter. The PM added that if the attempt to prevent the vote at the General Assembly does not succeed, he expects Jerusalem’s friends to vote against this decision.
Lapid sent his letter to the heads of state of Great Britain, France, Croatia, Romania, Bulgaria, the Netherlands, Slovakia, Latvia, Georgia, Brazil, Uruguay, Peru, and Vietnam, amongst other countries.
Earlier this month, following a request by the West Bank-based Palestinian Authority, a UN committee backed a preliminary resolution asking the ICJ for a legal opinion on the status of Israel’s “prolonged occupation, settlement and annexation of the Palestinian territory occupied since 1967.” The resolution was subsequently forwarded to the General Assembly plenary for official approval.
At the time, the Palestinian Authority welcomed the developments, hailing its recent success in the Fourth Committee as a “diplomatic and legal breakthrough” that would “open a new era for holding Israel accountable for its war crimes.”
While the ICJ’s advisory opinions are non-binding, a ruling against Israel could help codify into international law the Palestinians’ insistence that all of the West Bank and eastern Jerusalem should be within the final boundaries of their possible future state. In 2004, the ICJ already condemned Israel’s security barrier as being inconsistent with legal norms governing the conflict.
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StopAntisemitism.org, a US-based organization dedicated to exposing anti-Jewish hate crimes, has announced the top three finalists of its Antisemite of the Year contest — and rapper Kanye West is in the lead to win the dishonorable title.
The other finalists for the watchdog group’s fourth annual competition include Mohamed Hadid — the Palestinian-Jordanian father of supermodels Gigi and Bella Hadid — and Jon Minadeo II, head of the white supremacist Goyim Defense League (GDL).
“Though these three men promote antisemitism from three different directions, they are equally dangerous,” StopAntisemitism Executive Director Liora Rez said. “Together, they have all been a catastrophe for the well-being [of] Jewish people in the United States in 2022.”
West, who nowadays goes by ‘Ye,’ last month wrote on Twitter that he was going to go “death con 3 on JEWISH PEOPLE,” followed by a series of antisemitic rants on Twitter.
Mohamed Hadid has been called out for sharing some of the most egregious lies about the Jewish state imaginable, such as in 2020 when he attempted to link American police brutality to Israel. Although he later apologized for the Instagram post, it rang somewhat hollow when just months later he attributed a false quote to Jewish physicist Albert Einstein that compared Zionists to Nazi Germany.
Jon Minadeo II and his Goyim Defense League network are notoriously known for their flyer campaigns, distributing antisemitic pamphlets that blame Jews for the COVID-19 pandemic, 9/11, gun control, and more around American neighborhoods.
Voting for the finalist is still open, and the Antisemite of the Year 2022 will be announced on December 12.
Recommended Reading
- The IDF’s Judea and Samaria Challenge: A Spike in Attacks and Anti-terror Raids (Yaakov Lappin, Jewish News Syndicate)
- Murdering Jews Should Be as Unacceptable as Murdering Druze – Opinion (Gil Troy, Jerusalem Post)
- Israel Envoy to UN Launches Exhibition on Expulsion of Arab Jewry (Mike Wagenheim, i24NEWS)
- 8 ‘Outstanding Anglo Olim’ Honored With Nefesh B’Nefesh Award (Israel Hayom)
- Meet the 2 Jews of Guyana, a South American Nation With a Tradition of Religious Tolerance (Seth Wikas, Jewish Telegraphic Agency)
