An Israeli Border Police officer was injured when he was deliberately struck by a Palestinian driver near Hebron, The Times of Israel reported on Wednesday. The man sustained a major head wound and is in critical condition.
A Palestinian careened his car into an Israeli Border Police officer north of Hebron on Wednesday in the latest terror attack to occur near the restive West Bank city. […]
“On the side of the road a young man around 20 years old was lying unconscious with serious multisystem injuries,” a paramedic said, “[and] along with IDF medical soldiers who arrived at the scene we gave him life-saving first aid and took him in serious condition to Hadassah Hospital at Ein Kerem on life support.”
The driver of the vehicle was reportedly shot dead by security forces at the scene of the attack, which occurred near Halhul Junction on Route 60.
The attack is the latest in a wave of increased violence that has left at least eleven Israelis dead and over 150 injured since the beginning of October, according to Israel’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Earlier this week, Palestinian terrorists stabbed four people, including an 80-year-old woman and a 71-year-old man, in two separate attacks.
Various Israeli security experts and Palestinian activists have attributed the attacks to incitement coming from all levels of Palestinian society, including government officials. On Monday, the United States House of Representatives unanimously passed a resolution condemning incitement by the Palestinian Authority. At the time, the measure’s co-sponsor Ted Deutch (D – Fla.) said, “It is well past time for President Abbas to stand up and condemn all acts of violence, rather than encouraging violence by glorifying terrorists and teaching children to view Israelis as animals.”
Recent reports by the Middle East Media Research Institute and The New York Times have also shed light on the violent incitement sweeping Palestinian social media, which includes hashtags such as “Poison the Knife before You Stab” and “Slaughtering the Jews,” as well as graphic images and how-to guides encouraging more terror attacks. “One crude cartoon making the rounds on Facebook, including on the official Palestinian TV page before it disappeared late Tuesday, depicts an Israeli soldier as an ape, accompanied by a pig, over a bloodied youth,” The Times wrote. “Another has a close-up of a menacing blade, and is captioned: “This is not difficult. To the closest kitchen, and go in the name of God.”
Another report published in the Times this past October highlighted some of the popular “nationalistic” songs stoking the violence, including musical hits such as “Stab, stab” and “Run Over, Run Over the Settler.”
Earlier this week, the IDF shut down the al-Hurriya radio station located in Hebron, charging “that the station had broadcast vicious incitement against Israel, encouraged stabbing attacks, and supported violent resistance.”
PA President Mahmoud Abbas was reported saying last week that Israel has been an occupying power since its creation. In September, he called on Palestinians “not to allow” the “filthy feet” of Jews to defile the holy places in Jerusalem. In October, he said that Israel had “executed” a teen terrorist while the terrorist was recovering in an Israeli hospital.
The incitement on Palestinian social media has prompted some 20,000 Israelis to file a lawsuit demanding that Facebook block calls to violence. The lead plaintiff in the lawsuit, American-Israeli teacher and peace activist Richard Lakin, died last week due to wounds sustained in a terror attack in Jerusalem two weeks prior. Lakin’s son, Micah Avni, said in a conference call hosted by The Israel Project, “My father had been a great beneficiary of social media. He used Facebook and Twitter to express his thoughts on education and on peace. He also became the victim of a tremendous amount of incitement and hate on those vehicles.” The Israel Project publishes The Tower.
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