Two Hamas gunmen killed three people at a Jerusalem bus stop during morning rush hour, while Israel reaffirmed its vow to annihilate the Palestinian Islamist movement that sparked the Gaza war on Oct. 7.
According to police, the attackers, Palestinians from East Jerusalem, were shot dead by off-duty troops and an armed citizen. The shooting also injured at least eight individuals.
"The terrorists arrived at the scene by car in the morning, armed with an M-16 rifle and a handgun," a police spokesperson stated. "The terrorists began shooting at civilians before subsequently being killed at the scene."
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A white car is seen stopping beside the busy bus stop in security camera footage acquired by Reuters. Two men then emerge, rifles drawn, and charge at the crowd, scattering them. The Palestinian attackers were shot shortly afterwards.
Many first responders and security forces converged on the busy morning commuting area. According to Israeli media, the victims were a lady in her twenties, a woman in her sixties, and a 74-year-old rabbi.
The gunmen were identified as 30- and 38-year-old brothers associated with Hamas, which governs Gaza, by Israel's Shin Bet security service. Both had already served prison sentences in Israel.
"It is the same Hamas that carried out the horrible Oct. 7 massacre, the same Hamas that tries to murder us everywhere," Netanyahu said, shortly after meeting with U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken in Jerusalem. "I told him (Blinken): 'We swore, I swore, to eradicate Hamas. Nothing will stop us.'
Hamas, which has vowed to destroy Israel, claimed responsibility for the Jerusalem bombing, calling it "heroic."
"The operation was a natural response to the Occupation's (Israel's) unprecedented crimes," it claimed in a statement, noting the military attack in Gaza and the treatment of Palestinian inmates in Israeli jails.
Itamar Ben-Gvir, Israel's far-right police minister, told reporters at the scene that the incident "proves again how we must not show weakness, that we must speak to Hamas only through the (rifle) scopes, only through the war."
He also stated that Israel would maintain its strategy of relaxing regulations for the issuance of firearms permits to private persons.
