A 15-year-old boy was killed and 14 others injured in two bomb attacks at a bus stop in Jerusalem, Israeli police said. The blast occurred in two busy neighbourhoods on the outskirts of the city as people left for work.
The teenager who died was an Israeli-Canadian Jewish seminary student named Arie Shpak. The Israeli prime minister said the attack was “unlike what we have seen in recent years.” The atmosphere feels unsettled in a year of increased violence as Palestinian gun and knife attacks target Israelis and Israeli military offensives kill Palestinian gunmen and civilians in the occupied West Bank. increase. No group has yet said they were behind the blast. However, Palestinian extremist groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad both praised the perpetrators for what they described as an “operation.”
The first explosion occurred at Givat Shaul, near the main gates of Jerusalem, shortly after 7:00 a.m. (05:00 GMT on Wednesday).
According to Israeli medical officials, the blast injured 12 people, including his teenager, who later died at the Shaare Zedek Medical Center. About half an hour later, there was a second explosion at another entrance to the city, Lamot Junction. Three people were slightly injured. At the site of the first explosion, the sidewalk was littered with debris. Masked Israeli security forces cordoned off the scene, and badly damaged bicycle parts were placed in evidence bags.
The shaking of the building woke up a man from the ultra-Orthodox Jewish quarter across the street, he told the BBC.Many of the people waiting for the bus seem to come from the community. Small protests were also held, with Israeli youth holding signs demanding “revenge.”
Aryeh Schupak, 15, was murdered en route to a Jewish seminary. Deputy Chief of the Israeli Police Operations Department Sigar Bar Zvi said the bombs were made of “high-quality” explosives and were placed in bushes and behind walls at bus stops.
Given the nature of the attack, investigators may have been directed by an organized cell, she added. Israeli media, citing security sources, said both devices contained nails and were likely detonated remotely.
After meeting with Israel’s security chief, outgoing Prime Minister Yair Lapid said Arie Shpak was “a boy who has done nothing wrong to anyone in the world, just because he is Jewish.” “murdered,” he said. He also promised that security forces would “find these vicious terrorists, those behind them, and those who armed them.”
“I want to say to the people of Israel: We found her. They can escape; they can hide; it won’t help them; security forces will reach them. If they resist, they will be eliminated. “
A bus at Lamot Junction was littered with what appeared to be debris from the explosion.
The attack comes as Prime Minister-designate Benjamin Netanyahu and his Likud party negotiate a new coalition with far-right and religious parties.They won a parliamentary majority in elections where security was at stake. “We are still in a brutal war on terrorism,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said while visiting survivors of the attack in a hospital. “I will do my best.”
Itamar Ben-Gubir, leader of the ultranationalist Otsma Yehudit (Jewish Power) party, who will become Netanyahu’s Minister of Interior and oversee the police, visited the site of the first explosion and urged Israel to take action. said it must
