A gunman opened fire at a vehicle in Jerusalem on Tuesday, April 18, shortly before 07:10 (0410 GMT), according to Israeli police. Two people were injured, according to Israel's ambulance service, and officers were searching for the suspect, police said.
The attack took place in the Sheikh Yarrah neighborhood, where Jewish settler families have settled, making the neighborhood a focus of conflict in East Jerusalem, where protests frequently take place. It is the second event of these characteristics that has occurred in the eastern half of the city since yesterday.
The Magen David Adom emergency service reported that two men aged 50 and 48 were treated at the scene and taken to Shaare Zedek hospital in Jerusalem.
A large police device with patrol cars and a helicopter is currently deployed in Jerusalem to search for the suspect in the "terrorist attack", as the Israeli authorities refer to attacks committed by Arabs or Palestinians.
According to police, the victims were inside a car when they were attacked.
Jewish nationalists have sought to evict Palestinian residents in decades-long legal battles that helped spark the 11-day conflict between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza Strip in May 2021.
The alleged attack in Jerusalem came hours after a Palestinian woman stabbed and moderately wounded an Israeli man on Monday night at the entrance to a settlement in the occupied West Bank, near Jerusalem.
This new incident occurs in the midst of a sharp rise in tension between Israelis and Palestinians, triggered by clashes between Israeli police and Palestinian faithful on the Jerusalem Mosque Esplanade in full Ramadan, and which included attacks in the West Bank, in Tel Aviv and exchanges of fire with Palestinian or pro-Palestinian militias in Gaza, Lebanon and Syria.
The Palestinian-Israeli conflict is experiencing one of its deadliest years. So far in 2023, 98 Palestinians have been killed in the conflict, most of them militants in violent clashes with Israeli troops, but also civilians, including 18 minors; while on the Israeli side, 19 civilians have died, most of them settlers, and among them three minors.
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