Jerusalem (Reuters) – A Tel Aviv municipal patrol officer has died, Israeli officials said on Saturday, after being shot by a Palestinian on a street in central Tel Aviv.
The suspected shooter was then shot dead by another municipal patrol worker, Tel Aviv’s mayor Ron Huldai told Israel’s public broadcaster.
A statement from the Israeli police said the shooter was a 27 year-old resident of the Palestinian town of Jenin in the occupied West Bank. The Palestinian militant group Hamas praised the attack but did not take responsibility.
The shooting came a day after a Palestinian teen was killed in an attack by Israeli civilians on a Palestinian village in the West Bank.
Washington has expressed concern over a growing number of attacks by Jewish settlers on Palestinian villages in the West Bank, where violence has worsened since last year with increased Israeli raids amid Palestinian street attacks on Israelis.
Tel Aviv mayor Huldai said the municipal worker had approached the attacker after noticing something suspicious and was then fired at by the shooter. A second municipal worker then killed the shooter.
“We are standing at a very sad incident,” Huldai said. “We are praying for the well-being of the injured.”
In brief statement, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu praised the actions of the municipal patrol officers.
Despite the attack, tens of thousands protested in Tel Aviv, according to the Israeli public broadcaster, against the governing coalition’s planned judicial overhaul which would see the highest court stripped of much of its powers.
Proponents of the legislation say it restores balance to the branches of government, while those against say it removes checks on government powers.
Last month, the coalition passed legislation that removed the court’s power to strike down government actions based on the action being classified as “unreasonable.”
