Israel is preparing this Saturday to mobilize its reserve police and strengthen its military personnel after the deaths of three people in two attacks carried out the day before, in the midst of a escalation of tensions in the Middle East.
An Italian tourist was hit by a car near the Tel Aviv waterfront on Friday night and seven other people were injured.
The driver, killed by the police, was 45 years old and from Kfar Kassem, an Arab town in central Israel.
Three people were still in Ichilov hospital in the coastal city with minor injuries on Saturday, the institution said.
A few hours earlier there had been another attack on the Jewish settlement of Efrat, in the West Bank, a Palestinian territory occupied by Israel since 1967.
Two Anglo-Israeli sisters aged 16 and 20 were killed and their mother seriously injured during a gun attack against your vehicle.
more troops
Following the attacks, which coincided with the celebrations of Passover, the Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has ordered “the mobilization of all reserve border police units and the mobilization of additional forces (of the army) to deal with terrorist attacks”.
The police specified that four reserve battalions of its frontier corps will be deployed from Sunday in the city centre.
The battalions will add to the units already mobilized in the mixed city of Lod and in the Jerusalem region.
In the West Bank, the Israeli army said on Saturday that it was hit at night, near the Palestinian village of Yabad (north).
The soldiers “shot at the attackers” who were in a vehicle, and one person was identified as shot, according to a military statement.
Tension in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem
The Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas said the Tel Aviv attack was a “natural and legitimate response” to Israel’s “assault” on Jerusalem’s Al Aqsa mosque on Wednesday.
That day, Israeli police stormed the holy site to violently evict Muslim worshippers, actions that drew widespread international condemnation.
The brutal intervention by the armed forces, in the midst of the celebrations of the Muslim month of Ramadan, ended with 350 detainees and 37 injured, according to the police and the Palestinian Red Crescent Society.
Al Aqsa is located on Mosque Square, Islam’s third holiest site, and is located in East Jerusalem, the Palestinian sector of the city occupied and annexed by Israel since 1967.
The complex is erected atop the Temple Mount, considered the holiest site in Judaism.
Netanyahu said Israeli forces were forced to act “to restore order” by the presence of “extremists” in the mosque.
Thirty rockets were fired at Israel from Lebanon on Thursday the biggest climb since 2006 on the border between these two countries, technically still at war after several conflicts.
Israel responded by bombing Hamas infrastructure in the Gaza Strip, where it rules, and in southern Lebanon.
According to the Israeli military, the rockets were fired by “Palestinians” and probably by Hamas.
international concern
The European Union (EU) condemned the escalation of violence on Saturday and called for containment.
“We urge all parties to exercise maximum restraint, avoid further escalations and promote calm on religious holidays,” the bloc’s diplomacy chief, Josep Borrell, said in a statement.
Netanyahu has promised to make Israel’s “enemies” pay a “high price” for “any aggression” against his country.
Since April 2022, no rockets have been fired from Lebanon towards Israel, which then also carried out attacks against its neighbor.
However, this it is the most serious incident since the 2006 war against the Shiite movement Hezbollah, very present in southern Lebanon.
“The entire axis of the resistance is in a state of alert,” Naim Qasem, the movement’s deputy, said on Friday.
Source: AFP
Source: Clarin
Mary Ortiz is a seasoned journalist with a passion for world events. As a writer for News Rebeat, she brings a fresh perspective to the latest global happenings and provides in-depth coverage that offers a deeper understanding of the world around us.