Arabs opened fire with a blaze of bullets aimed at security personnel at a guard post just outside of Jerusalem this morning (Thursday).
The attack occurred at a checkpoint on Highway 60 north of the capital staffed by Border Police personnel at the entrance to Kalandia.
Several bullets managed to reach their target, hitting the building where security personnel were taking cover. The guard post was damaged but no one was injured, according to the IDF spokesperson who said 29 bullet casings were recovered at the source of the gunfire.
A full M-16 or AK-47 magazine clip typically holds 29 bullets. PA police are armed with AK-47 weapons.
The incident raises new questions about growing Arab violence around the country, and threats of a new intifada aimed at Israelis.
A cartoon posted on Facebook March 11th by the Fatah Mobilization and Organization Commission and translated by the Palestinian Media Watch (PMW) watchdog group called for the return to armed struggle. Fatah is led by PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas. Less than a week later, a member of the faction’s central committee declared on official PA TV, “A national enterprise cannot succeed without the National Liberation Movement, Fatah. We in this movement have not cast down the rifle and have not let go of the rifle. The rifle is here!”
Just one day earlier (Wednesday) Palestinian Authority youths in Bethlehem set fire to an IDF watchtower, according to the Bethlehem-based Ma’an news agency. Photos of the incident were allegedly posted on the Facebook page of the Aida “refugee camp.”
Quoting an IDF spokesperson, the news agency reported “20 Palestinians hurling rocks and they also rolled a burning tire” at nearby Aida, a so-called “refugee camp” but was unaware of arson at the watchtower.
An alleged incident involving an IDF soldier who claimed he was stabbed by a group of PA Arabs in Pisgat Ze’ev on Thursday morning was later found to be a false report. The soldier later confessed to police the attack had never taken place.