The Israel Police said on Tuesday it shot a Hamas terrorist after he tried to carry out a car-ramming attack on a police checkpoint near the Israeli city of Ma’ale Adumim, just north of Jerusalem in the Judean Desert.
“During a vehicle inspection in the Mishor Adumim area, near Highway 1, a driver attempted to hit a police officer with his vehicle and fled the scene,” the Israel Police said in an initial statement on the incident.
“After fleeing the scene, the vehicle reached another police checkpoint, where it attempted to escape once more and was shot by police,” it said.
No casualties were reported in the attempted ramming. The head of the Israel Police’s Judea and Samaria District visited the scene of the attack.
On Tuesday night, police identified the terrorist, who was evacuated to an Israeli hospital for treatment in serious condition, as a 41-year-old Palestinian “with a criminal and security background” from al-Eizariya, close to Ma’ale Adumim. The suspect has ties to Hamas, police noted.
“Following a situation assessment conducted by Judea and Samaria District Cmdr. Moshe Finzi, he directed the deployment of increased forces in the area and carrying out rigorous checks with the aim of maintaining public security and responding immediately to any incident,” concluded Tuesday night’s Israel Police statement.
Palestinian terrorists targeted Israeli Jews in Judea and Samaria at least 6,343 times in 2024, according to figures published earlier this year by the Rescuers Without Borders (Hatzalah Judea and Samaria) NGO.
Twenty-seven Israelis were murdered in Judea and Samaria in 2024, and more than 300 others were wounded, the group said in its annual report.
The figures, which were cross-checked against official data from Israel’s security services, included 3,668 instances of rock-throwing, 843 attacks with Molotov cocktails, 671 attempts to blind drivers with laser pointers, 526 explosive charges, 364 cases of arson and 179 terrorist shootings.
The NGO also recorded 37 attempted or successful stabbings, 36 bottles of paint being thrown at vehicles and 19 Arab car-ramming attacks, including 12 that caused injuries to Israeli victims.