Palestinian attacker wounds 8 in Tel Aviv as Israel presses on with West Bank operation

A Palestinian man drove his car into a crowded bus stop in Tel Aviv on Tuesday and then began stabbing people, wounding eight in an attack praised by the militant group Hamas as a response to Israel’s ongoing military operation in the occupied West Bank.

Police chief Kobi Shabtai told reporters at the scene that an armed civilian shot and killed the assailant.

The attack came as Israeli troops pressed ahead with their hunt for Palestinian militants and weapons in the Jenin refugee camp, after military bulldozers tore through alleys and thousands of residents fled to safety. The two-day Palestinian death toll rose to 10.

The large-scale raid of the camp, which began Monday, is one of the most intense military operations in the West Bank in nearly two decades. It bore hallmarks of Israeli tactics during the second Palestinian uprising in the early 2000s and came as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu faces growing pressure from his ultranationalist political allies for a tough response to recent attacks on Israeli settlers, including a shooting last month that killed four people.

But the current violence is also different from the intense years of what was known as the second intifada, a period that claimed thousands of lives. It’s more limited in scope, with Israeli military operations focused on several strongholds of Palestinian militants.

More than 140 Palestinians have been killed this year in the West Bank, victims of a more-than-yearlong spike in violence that has seen some of the worst bloodshed in the area in nearly two decades. Palestinian attacks targeting Israelis have killed at least 26 people.

Hamas, the Islamist group that rules the Gaza Strip, praised Tuesday’s attack in Tel Aviv as “heroic and revenge for the military operation in Jenin” and later claimed that the driver was a member, though it was not immediately clear if he was dispatched by the group or acted on his own. Islamic Jihad, a militant group with a large presence in Jenin, also praised the assault.

Israeli’s internal security agency, Shin Bet, identified the attacker as a Palestinian from the West Bank with no prior security record.

Shabtai, the police chief, said that several people connected to the man were arrested, but he did not provide details.

Rubble littered the streets of Jenin early Tuesday, and there were reports of damage to shops. Columns of black smoke periodically punctuated the skyline over the refugee camp, which along with the adjacent city of the same name has been a flashpoint since Israeli-Palestinian violence began escalating in the spring of 2022. It was also a hotbed of Palestinian military activity in the second Palestinian uprising in the early 2000s.

Jenin Mayor Nidal Obeidi said that around 4,000 Palestinians had fled the camp, finding accommodation in the homes of relatives and in shelters. Residents said there was no water or electricity in the camp.

Across the West Bank, Palestinians observed a general strike to protest the Israeli raid.

The Palestinian Health Ministry reported two more deaths overnight, raising the death toll to 10. The Israeli military claimed that all were militants, but did not provide details.

During Tuesday’s operations, the military said it had seized weapons and demolished tunnels beneath a mosque in the refugee camp. Israeli media reported that the army had arrested at least 120 suspected Palestinian militants since Monday.

A spokesman for the Israeli military, Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari, said Monday that Israel had launched the operation because some 50 attacks over the last year had been launched from Jenin. Israeli media reported that the army had arrested at least 120 suspected Palestinian militants since Monday.

The Palestinian self-rule government in the West Bank and three Arab countries that have diplomatic ties with Israel — Jordan, Egypt and the United Arab Emirates — condemned Israel’s incursion, as did the 57-nation Organization of Islamic Cooperation.