Tel Aviv, March 23, (dpa/GNA) – Israel, has put its security forces on heightened alert in its south and in the Palestinian territories, following a terrorist attack in which four people were killed.
Authorities fear the attack could inspire copycat offenders, Israel’s public broadcaster reported on Wednesday.
According to media reports, the attacker was a Bedouin from the Negev desert in southern Israel, who was said to be a supporter of the Islamic State terrorist militia.
Authorities have confirmed that a male attacker killed two women and two men and seriously injured two other women, in the city of Beersheba on Tuesday.
The 34-year-old suspect rammed into a 50-year-old cyclist with his car before getting out and attacking others with a knife in a shopping centre. He was shot by a passer-by.
It was one of the most severe attacks with Israeli victims in recent years.
In early 2017, a Palestinian drove his truck into a group of young soldiers in Jerusalem, killing four.
Attacks by Palestinians have increased in recent months in the West Bank and the Arab-dominated eastern part of Jerusalem. Several Palestinians have also been killed in Israeli raids.
A spokesperson for Hamas, the Islamist group that rules the Gaza Strip, praised Tuesday’s attack.
Israel conquered the West Bank and East Jerusalem, among other territories, in the 1967 Six-Day War. The Palestinians claim the territories for their own hoped-for state, which would have East Jerusalem as its capital.
GNA