Jerusalem attack: 2 Israeli police officers fatally shot
Temple has been temporarily closed
JERUSALEM — In an extraordinarily brazen assault early Friday, three Arab citizens of Israel armed with guns and knives killed two Israeli police officers guarding an entrance to Jerusalem’s holiest site for Jews andMuslims.
Security camera footage showed the armed assailants emerging to attack from within the sacred compound in the Old City of Jerusalem that Jews revere as the Temple Mount and Muslims as the Noble Sanctuary. Police officers pursued the assailants, who fled back inside the compound and exchanged fire; all three assailants were killed.
Police identified the slain officers as Advanced Staff Sgt. Maj. Hayil Satawi, 30, who was married with a 3week-old son; and Advanced Staff Sgt. Maj. Kamil Shnaan, 22, the son of a formerparliamentarian.
Shin Bet, the Israeli internal security service, identified the assailants as residents of Umm el-Fahm, a large Arab town in central Israel: Muhammad Ahmed Jabarin, 29; Muhammad Hamid Jabarin, 19; and Muhammad Ahmed Mufdal Jabarin, 19. It was not immediately known if the three were related, but their names indicated that they belonged to the same large clan.
“We cannot allow for agents of murder, who desecrate the name of God, to drag us into a bloody war, and we will deal with a heavy hand against all the arms of terror, and its perpetrators,” President Reuven Rivlin of Israel said.
The police announced that they had evacuated and closed the compound.
The closing of the holy site is an exceptional and potentially explosive measure; Israeli-imposed restrictions on Muslim entry to the compound have prompted spasms of rioting in Palestinian areas in the past.
Apparently in an effort to calm the atmosphere, Mahmoud Abbas, the president of the Palestinian Authority, telephoned Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel and strongly condemned the attack. He also called on Mr. Netanyahu to reopen the holy site, according to the Palestinian news agency Wafa.
Keenly aware of the sensitivities, the Israeli police described Friday’s events as “extraordinary and extreme,” adding in a statement: “Shooting on the Temple Mount is a grave and delicate occurrence and it will be dealt with accordingly.”
Authorities said the site would remain closed to worshippers until the investigation of Friday’s events was completed, and that it was likely to reopen gradually after the weekend.