Netanyahu mobilizes reserves after deadly Tel Aviv, W. Bank attacks
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu mobilized police and army reserves after separate attacks killed three people, including an Italian tourist, in the West Bank and Tel Aviv, in the latest escalation of deadly violence.
Despite appeals for restraint, violence has surged since Israeli police clashed with Palestinians Wednesday inside Jerusalem's al-Aqsa mosque, with Israel bombarding both Gaza and Lebanon following rocket fire by Palestinian militants.
The latest flare-up in tensions comes during what is both the Jewish Passover and the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.
Earlier on Friday, two British-Israeli sisters aged 16 and 20 were killed, and their mother seriously wounded in a shooting attack in the occupied West Bank.
Israel's army said it had launched a manhunt for the perpetrators.
Later, in central Tel Aviv, one man was killed and seven people aged between 17 and 74 wounded when a car rammed into pedestrians walking on a cycling path along the seafront, and flipped over, Israeli rescue services and police said.
"All the victims were tourists," the Magen David Adom emergency service said.
Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni identified the deceased as 36-year-old Alessandro Parini.
The Ichilov hospital in Tel Aviv said it had received three injured Britons and one wounded Italian.
A police spokesman told AFP that "the terrorist was neutralized, it was a terror attack against civilians, a car ramming attack."
Shortly afterwards, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu "instructed the Israel Police to mobilize all reserve border police units and has directed the IDF (Israeli army) to mobilize additional forces," his office said.
Oded Revivi, mayor of the illegal settlement of Efrat, confirmed that the dead in the West Bank shooting were Israeli sisters aged 16 and 20, and that the wounded woman was their mother.
A British diplomat later confirmed that the two also held UK passports, while calling for "all parties... to de-escalate tensions."
Friday's attacks came after Israel launched air strikes and an artillery bombardment before dawn in response to rocket fire from the Gaza Strip and Lebanon.
A Qatari official on Friday said Doha was mediating between Israel and the Palestinians.
Doha -- which has previously mediated between Israel and Hamas -- "is working to deescalate the situation on all sides, with the latest contact being noon today," the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
Israeli riot police stormed the prayer hall of al-Aqsa mosque in a pre-dawn Wednesday raid aiming to dislodge "law-breaking youths and masked agitators" they said had barricaded themselves inside.
The violence sparked an exchange of rockets and air strikes with militants in Gaza.
U.N. chief Antonio Guterres has urged "all actors to exercise maximum restraint."
The United States on Friday voiced solidarity with Israel after the Tel Aviv attack, saying that "the targeting of innocent civilians of any nationality is unconscionable," according to State Department spokesman Vedant Patel.
France vowed "unwavering" support for "Israel's security and Lebanon's stability and sovereignty," while an Iranian foreign ministry spokesperson "strongly condemned the attacks of the aggressor Zionist regime" and Russia called for a "lasting ceasefire."
Hamas and Islamic Jihad told Egypt, a longstanding mediator between Israel and the Palestinians, that rocket fire would continue "if Israel continues its aggressions and air strikes but, if these aggressions stop, they will cease fire," Palestinian sources said.
Source: Agence France Presse
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