Israeli soldier fatally stabbed in West Bank; army says suspect a Palestinian police officer

Israeli soldier fatally stabbed in West Bank

JERUSALEM — A knife-wielding Palestinian police officer killed an Israeli soldier Wednesday as he sat in a jeep stopped at a traffic light in the West Bank, the military said, in a rare case of violence recently in the territory.

The attacker reached through the window and stabbed the soldier in the chest, the military said. The wounded soldier, who was alone in the vehicle, tried to drive away, but lost consciousness and the jeep spun out of control and flipped over.

The military identified the suspect as Mahmoud al-Khattib, a Palestinian police officer. He tried to flee after the attack, but a private Israeli security officer hit the suspect with his car, subduing him until police arrived. The dead soldier was identified as Staff Sgt. Ihab Khatib, an Israeli Arab from the Galilee region.

Neighbors said al-Khattib is a 27-year-old with ties to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’ Fatah group.

Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad denounced the attack and said it “conflicts with our national interests.” He pledged to take steps to prevent such incidents in the future, while endorsing “peaceful resistance” against settlements and Israel’s West Bank separation barrier.

A Palestinian ambulance was the first to arrive to help the soldier, said medic Abed Safouri. “I realized that he was clinically dead, but we gave him first aid, and we left when the Israelis took him,” he said.

After the attack, Israeli soldiers entered al-Khattib’s house in a village in the northern West Bank and ordered young men out, witnesses said.

Palestinian security authorities were informed of the attack and said they would carry out their own investigation, said Maj. Peter Lerner, a spokesman for the Israeli military’s West Bank forces.

“It is extraordinary that a Palestinian policeman would carry out such an attack, and we want to get to the bottom of this,” Lerner said.

The dead soldier was a member of the small Druse community, an Arab sect whose followers serve in the Israeli military, unlike most of the rest of the nation’s Arab citizens. Many Druse join the paramilitary border police.

Khatib, 28, served in a regular army unit in the West Bank. As news of the attack spread, dozens of neighbors converged on his house in the village of Maghar in Israel’s north. The village has both Christian Arab and Druse residents.

Israel’s Y-net news site said one of Khatib’s sisters was killed in a rocket attack from Lebanon during the 2006 war and a brother, a soldier, was killed during an Israeli military operation in the West Bank a decade ago.

Lethal attacks were once frequent in the West Bank but have become relatively rare as Palestinian forces were given increased security responsibility over parts of the territory.

In December, gunmen shot to death a Jewish settler on a road in the West Bank.

In response to Wednesday’s stabbing, settlers claimed the increased Palestinian security presence had led to the attack.

Tensions have increased between Jewish settlers and the government since Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared — under U.S. pressure — a slowdown in construction in West Bank settlements in an attempt to restart peace talks.

Settler spokesman Yishai Hollender said Wednesday that Netanyahu’s policies were “again costing us in blood.”

Associated Press writers Mohammed Daraghmeh in Ramallah, West Bank, and Mohammed Ballas in Yaabed, West Bank contributed to this report.