BICOM

Terror attacks were prevented yesterday in three separate incidents, as Israeli security forces intercepted two cars heading to harm Israelis, and shot a knife-wielding Palestinian man.

In one incident, a 31-year-old Palestinian man, later named as Rami Awartani, attempted to stab Israeli soldiers at a West Bank checkpoint and was shot dead by troops at the scene. The man exited his car at the Hawara checkpoint near Nablus and ran at soldiers brandishing a knife. The troops opened fire and killed Awartani. An IDF spokesperson said that the attempted attack was under investigation.

The incident followed a similar attempt by a Palestinian woman to stab soldiers at the Qalandiya checkpoint near Ramallah last week. She was asked to stop approaching the soldiers multiple times, but was shot in the leg and wounded when she refused to do so.

Also yesterday, four Palestinian men were apprehended in the West Bank and detained on suspicion of planning an axe attack in the southern city of Beer Sheva. Israel police received intelligence earlier in the day of a planned axe attack in Beer Sheva. The city’s residents were urged to be vigilant. A short while later, Israeli troops found an abandoned vehicle with an axe inside near Khirbat Umm al-Khair in the Hebron Hills area. Subsequently, they found four men in the area who were thought to have fled the scene. Since October, a wave of Palestinian attacks has claimed at least 40 lives.

Yesterday evening, an Israeli citizen from the southern Bedouin town of Rahat was arrested and taken for questioning, after his car was found to be carrying six improvised pipe bombs. He was stopped at a checkpoint in the northern West Bank, travelling in the direction of the major central city of Kfar Saba. Initially, four pipe bombs were found in his car, but sappers discovered an additional two explosives. A major artery, Route Five was temporarily closed to traffic.