Three Israeli police officers were killed in a drive-by shooting on Sunday morning near the Tarqumiya checkpoint, some 7.5 miles northwest of Hebron in Judea.
Magen David Adom paramedics treated a male and a female officer at the scene before pronouncing them dead. Another male officer was seriously wounded and evacuated to Soroka Medical Center in Beersheva, where he was later pronounced dead.
They were later named as Chief Inspector Arik Ben Eliyahu, 37, of Kiryat Gat, who is survived by his wife and three children; Command Sgt. Maj. Hadas Branch, 53, of Sde Moshe, who is survived by her husband, three children and granddaughter; and 1st Sgt. Roni Shakuri, 61, of Sderot, who is survived by his wife, daughter and granddaughter.
Shakuri’s other daughter, 1st Sgt. Mor Shakuri, 29, was killed on Oct. 7 while battling an attempt by Hamas terrorists to take control of the police station in Sderot, in southern Israel near the border with Gaza.
The Israel Defense Forces on Sunday initiated a search for the terrorists, who opened fire from a car at the police vehicle with the three officers inside on Route 35 and then fled on foot. The road was closed to traffic and security forces were preparing to search the nearby Palestinian village of Idna.
Later on Sunday, IDF and Israel Security Agency (Shin Bet) fighters surrounded a house in Hebron where terrorists were believed to be holed up, the military said in a statement. At least one terrorist linked to Sunday morning’s attack was “neutralized” at the site, the IDF stated.
According to reports, the terrorist who carried out the shooting was a member of Palestinian Authority chief Mahmoud Abbas‘s “Presidential Guard,” though it was unclear whether he still held the position.
Israel Police Commissioner Daniel Levy and National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir arrived at the scene of the attack.
“I am certain and convinced that together with the IDF we will find and eliminate the despicable terrorists who harmed three of our good policemen,” Levy said at the scene.
Ben-Gvir said, “The right to life [of Israelis] prevails over the freedom of movement of the Palestinians.”
The minister later tweeted, in a lengthy post about the Judea attack and the bodies of six hostages recovered in Gaza overnight Saturday, that the attack “once again proved, unfortunately, the dire consequences of terrorists roaming freely in the area.
“Terrorism must be fought without imagination and without following [failed] security assumptions. In Gaza as in Judea and Samaria. The Palestinian Authority is a terrorist authority—an instigator of terrorism, pays salaries to murderers of Jews, its police officers engage in terrorism, and the Al-Aqsa Brigades [Fatah-affiliated terrorist group] belong to it,” Ben-Gvir continued.
“Those who trust them, endanger the State of Israel. Unfortunately, the security assumptions also control the roads; when Defense Minister Gallant orders to open roadblocks for the Palestinians, the result is the murder of Jews. It is forbidden to be bleeding hearts at the expense of the lives of our citizens—our right to live and not to be murdered, prevails over their right of movement. We need to close the traffic lanes we travel on to the residents of the P.A.”
The head of the Gush Etzion Council, Yaron Rosenthal, called on the IDF to “start the operation to clean up the nests of terrorism in the [P.A.’s] Hebron Governorate and the surrounding area.”
On Saturday, an IDF soldier was killed and three others wounded during clashes with Hamas terrorists in Jenin in northern Samaria.
The slain man was identified as Staff Sgt. Elkana Navon, 20, from Petach Tikvah.
Also on Saturday, the Hamas terrorist group hailed the previous day’s “double heroic operation” after car bombers wounded three Israelis in the Gush Etzion region of Judea.
