Palestinian gunmen kill 6 people in attack on Jerusalem bus stop

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JERUSALEM (AP) — Palestinian attackers opened fire at a bus stop during the morning rush hour in Jerusalem on Monday, killing six people and wounding another 12, according to Israeli officials.

An Israeli soldier and civilians who were at the scene shot and killed the two attackers, said police, who later arrested a third person in connection with the shooting. Footage of the attack showed dozens of people fleeing from the bus stop at a busy intersection. The windshield of a bus was riddled with bullet holes and belongings were scattered across the street.

The war in Gaza has killed tens of thousands of Palestinians and sparked a surge of violence in Israel and the occupied West Bank, with a rise in attacks by Palestinian militants as well as Israeli settler violence against Palestinians.

Monday’s shooting — at a major intersection, with a road leading to Jewish settlements in east Jerusalem — was the deadliest in Israel since October 2024.

Later on Monday, the Palestinian Health Ministry said two 14-year-old Palestinians had been shot and killed by Israeli forces in the West Bank city of Jenin, where Israel has carried out several major military operations in recent years.

The military said troops fired at individuals who had entered an area under a closure order. It said they posed a threat to its forces, without specifying the nature of the threat or providing evidence, and that they had ignored instructions to leave.

Paramedics who responded to the scene said broken glass covered the area, and people wounded lay unconscious on the road and a sidewalk near the bus stop. Israel’s Shin Bet internal security agency said the two attackers were 20- and 21-year-old Palestinians from the West Bank with no prior arrests.

Hamas hailed the attack without claiming responsibility, calling it a “natural response to the occupation’s crimes against our people.”

President Mahmoud Abbas, head of the internationally recognized Palestinian Authority, condemned “any targeting of Palestinian and Israeli civilians,” and “denounced all forms of violence and terrorism, regardless of their source,” according to a statement from his office.

The Palestinian Authority, which administers parts of the West Bank and cooperates with Israel on security matters, has been largely sidelined since the start of the war.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visited the scene after his ongoing corruption trial was delayed due to the attack. He praised the soldier who fired on the gunmen, who was from a newly-formed unit for ultra-Orthodox Jewish soldiers.

Later, he warned that Israel would respond to such attacks with wide military raids, referring to operations that inflicted heavy destruction on built-up refugee camps in Jenin and other parts of the West Bank, and displaced tens of thousands of Palestinians earlier this year.

“The fact that we eliminated these two terrorists is not enough. The fact that we go after the supporters and aides, that is not enough either,” Netanyahu said.

"We have already eliminated nests of terror in refugee camps, in three. We simply evacuated the population from there and flattened all the terror infrastructure — and my instruction is to do the same in other nests of terror.”

Hundreds of security forces searched for additional attackers or explosives that could have been planted around the area. On Monday afternoon, police said they arrested a resident of east Jerusalem who was connected to the attack.

The Israeli military said it is encircling Palestinian villages on the outskirts of the nearby West Bank city of Ramallah as it steps up defense in response.

In October 2024, two Palestinians from the West Bank opened fire inside a light rail train in Tel Aviv, killing seven people and leaving many others wounded. Hamas’ military wing claimed responsibility for that attack, the deadliest in Israel since the Oct. 7, 2023 raid that started the war in Gaza.

Data from the U.N.’s humanitarian office says at least 49 Israelis, including some soldiers and police, have been killed by Palestinians in Israel or the West Bank between the start of the war and July this year.

During the same period, Israeli forces and civilians killed at least 968 Palestinians in Israel and the West Bank, according to the data. The Israeli military has said many were militants, though the dead have also included stone throwers and uninvolved civilians. ___

Associated Press writer Samy Magdy in Cairo contributed to this report.

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