Jerusalem was rocked on Saturday morning by the second shooting in less than 24 hours, following two days of spiralling violence in Israel and the Palestinian territories.
Police said that a 13-year-old resident of East Jerusalem had shot a father and a son near the historic Old City, and that he had then been “neutralised and injured”. Israel’s emergency service said that the two victims had been hospitalised with upper body wounds.
The shooting in the Silwan neighbourhood came just hours after a Palestinian gunman shot dead seven Israelis and injured three more near a synagogue on the outskirts of Jerusalem on Friday, in the deadliest shooting in the holy city since 2008.
The twin shootings — which followed the deadliest Israeli raid in the occupied West Bank for years and an exchange of fire between Israel’s air force and militants in Gaza — have heightened fears that the simmering Israeli-Palestinian conflict could escalate into a broader confrontation.
The eruption of violence is the first big test for Benjamin Netanyahu’s hardline new government, widely seen as the most rightwing in Israel’s history. It took office in December with ultranationalists in key security posts pledging to bolster security and take a tougher stance against the Palestinians.
Speaking ahead of a meeting of the security cabinet on Saturday night, Netanyahu said Israel’s response to the shootings would be “strong, swift and precise”, and urged civilians not to “take the law into your own hands”.
“Whoever tries to harm us — we will harm them and everyone who assists them,” he said, adding that his government would speed up the demolition of attackers’ houses. He also proposed accelerating the licensing of weapons for “authorised civilians”, and revoking national insurance rights from “families that support terrorism”.
“While we are not seeking escalation, we are prepared for any scenario,” he said.
Police said that the first shooting, which took place on Holocaust Memorial day as worshippers were leaving a synagogue in the Jewish settlement of Neve Ya’akov, was carried out by a 21-year-old resident of East Jerusalem, who they believe acted alone.
On Saturday morning, police detained 42 people in connection with the shooting, including members of the gunman’s family, and said they were examining whether they had any connection with or prior knowledge of the attack.
They added that security in Jerusalem would be stepped up, while the military said it was deploying three extra battalions to the West Bank, which forms the bulk of the Palestinian territories, but has been occupied by Israel since 1967.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility for either attack, although Palestinian militant groups praised the first. Hazem Qassem, a Hamas spokesman, said it was a “natural response to the occupation’s criminal actions”.
Israeli-Palestinian tensions have been running high for months, with 190 Palestinians and 31 Israelis killed last year amid near-nightly clashes between Israeli security forces and Palestinian militants in the West Bank, and a 56-hour conflict between Israel and militants in Gaza last August.
But in the past week they have escalated dramatically. On Thursday, Israeli commandos killed nine Palestinians during a raid on the Jenin refugee camp that targeted militants from Palestinian Islamic Jihad in the deadliest raid on the camp for two decades.
In response, Islamic Jihad militants in Gaza fired rockets at Israel on Thursday night. This prompted Israel to bomb targets in the coastal enclave, which has been blockaded by Israel and Egypt since the Hamas militant group took power in 2007. No casualties were reported on either side.
In a separate incident on Friday night, three Palestinians were hospitalised after being shot by an Israeli settler near Nablus in the north of the West Bank, according to Palestinian media.
The Palestinian Authority said on Thursday night that it was cancelling security co-operation with Israel in response to the raid on Jenin, prompting US officials to urge them to reverse the decision.
US secretary of state Antony Blinken is due to travel to Israel and the West Bank next week as part of a pre-planned visit to the region. CIA chief William Burns was also visiting on Friday.
A spokesperson for UN secretary-general, António Guterres, said he condemned Friday’s shooting and was “deeply worried” about the escalating violence. “This is the moment to exercise utmost restraint,” the spokesperson said.
