BICOM

A 30-year-old Israeli woman, in the advanced stages of pregnancy, was stabbed yesterday by a Palestinian male in the West Bank settlement of Tekoa.

Michal Froman was shopping at a clothing warehouse, when the attacker arrived and asked the price of an item. As she approached to help him, Froman was stabbed in the upper body and the assailant fled the scene. Froman was taken to hospital in Jerusalem and was not seriously wounded, while her unborn child remained unharmed. The attacker, thought to be a 15-year-old Palestinian from a nearby village was shot and wounded by security personnel. Froman is the daughter-in-law of the late Rabbi Menachem Froman, the leading rabbi in Tekoa who was well-known for his coexistence work alongside local Palestinians.

Yesterday’s attack comes just a day after the country was shocked by the killing of 38-year-old Dafna Meir, who was stabbed to death at the entrance to her home in the West Bank settlement of Otniel. The attack was witnessed by her eldest of six children, who said that Meir fought the attacker, a 16-year-old local Palestinian arrested this morning following a two-day manhunt. Meir was laid to rest yesterday in Jerusalem. Her funeral was attended by an estimated 1,500 people, including government ministers.

US State Department spokesman John Kirby yesterday condemned “in the strongest possible terms the terrorist attacks over the past two days against Israeli civilians.” They are the latest incidents in a wave of near-daily attacks on Israelis, which have left at least 27 Israelis dead since October.

However, while manyof the attacks have taken place on the streets of Israeli cities, the stabbings of the last two days have occurred within settlements. In light of this development, the IDF commander of the Judea and Samaria Division, Brig. Gen. Lior Carmeli yesterday announced that Palestinian labourers have been temporarily banned from working in West Bank settlements themselves, but not nearby industrial areas. The decision will be reviewed on a daily basis.