Three IDF soldiers hurt in suspected West Bank car ramming attack
According to an initial investigation, the incident was likely an intentional terror attack, the IDF said.
By TOVAH LAZAROFF, JPOST.COM STAFFUpdated: JULY 6, 2016 23:54Suspected car-ramming attack near Neve Daniel in the West Bank, July 6, 2016(photo credit: POLICE SPOKESPERSON'S UNIT)
Three soldiers were lightly wounded on Wednesday afternoon when a car driven by a Palestinian terrorist rammed their vehicle, causing it to overturn on Route 60 in Gush Etzion.The Palestinian driver was taken in serious condition to a hospital in Jerusalem.Security forces are on alert along Route 60 as it stretches through the West Bank from Jerusalem to Beersheba.On Friday, on Route 60 in the South Hebron Hills, Palestinian gunmen killed Rabbi Michael “Miki” Mark, 47, who was the director of the Otniel Yeshiva. The father of 10 was driving on that road with his wife, Chava, and two of his children.Chava Mark remains hospitalized in Hadassah-University Medical Center in Jerusalem’s Ein Kerem. The two teenagers who were also wounded have since been released from the hospital.Last Thursday, on June 30, Muhammad Tarayrah, 17, murdered teenager Hallel Yaffa Ariel while she slept in her home in the Kiryat Arba settlement, which is located off of Route 60.On Wednesday Mark’s children urged Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman to build a settlement near the spot where their father was killed on Friday.“The response [to the attack] can’t be more security or just a number of new homes. The response must be the creation of additional settlements, as a message to the terrorists that this is our home,” Miriam Mark said.“We will not move from here,” she added.She spoke while Liberman paid a condolence call to their home in the South Hebron Hills settlement of Otniel.
The Mark family, with its 10 children, lives just up the street from the home of Dafna Meir, who was stabbed to death in January when a Palestinian terrorist infiltrated the settlement and entered her home.According to a spokesman for the South Hebron Hills Regional Council, Liberman promised the family, “I have no intention of remaining passive. We will build and we will take care of security.”He added that “the issue is not just with defense. We have to take off the head of the snake.”Family members thanked the soldiers for their work in combating terrorism.South Hebron Hills Regional Council head Yohai Damri said that the IDF needs to do more to secure the area.He added that he is particularly concerned with incitement in area mosques against Jews.“Every Friday there are calls to ‘slaughter the Jews,’” Damri said.Separately, on Wednesday tenders were published for 42 homes in Kiryat Arba.Channel 2 announced that the government planned to also approve NIS 50 million for Kiryat Arba. But its council head, Malachi Levinger, said the council has not yet been informed of that measure