JERUSALEM (AFP) – A Palestinian ran towards Israeli troops while brandishing a knife in the occupied West Bank on Wednesday and soldiers shot and wounded him, the military said.
“An assailant armed with a knife ran towards troops adjacent to the Gush Etzion junction,” an army statement said.
“In response to the immediate threat, soldiers fired shots towards the suspect. Subsequently, the suspect was injured and taken to hospital for medical treatment,” it said.
A military spokeswoman told AFP that the attacker was a Palestinian and that no soldiers were injured.
Israeli media said the man was moderately to seriously wounded.
The Gush Etzion junction is a busy intersection near a large bloc of Israeli settlements in the southern West Bank and the scene of repeated attacks.
A wave of unrest that erupted in October 2015 has claimed the lives of at least 295 Palestinians or Arab Israelis, 51 Israelis, two Americans, two Jordanians, an Eritrean, a Sudanese and a Briton, according to an AFP toll.
The last fatal incident was the October 4 stabbing of Israeli settler Reuven Schmerling, 70, in what the Shin Bet security service said was “a terrorist attack”.
Two Palestinians from Qabatiya in the northern West Bank were arrested as suspects.
The violence, however, has largely subsided in recent months.
Israeli authorities say most of the Palestinians killed were carrying out knife, gun or car-ramming attacks.
Others were shot dead in protests and clashes, while some were killed in Israeli air strikes on the Gaza Strip.
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