Jerusalem is drawn into the violence

05 August 2014 - 02:08 By Bloomberg
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Two separate attacks in Jerusalem yesterday have raised concerns that the four-week war in Gaza may be sparking violence inside Israel.

The driver of a construction excavator was shot dead by police after he rammed his vehicle into a bus, overturning it and killing one passenger.

Just over an hour later, a man was shot in the stomach near the city's Hebrew University by an assailant on a motorbike, police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said.

Jerusalem mayor Nir Barkat told Israel Radio the man who was shot was a soldier.

The violence in a city that had been largely calm since fighting between Israel and Hamas escalated on July 8 came after Israel's military called a seven-hour truce in some parts of Gaza while continuing to strike targets elsewhere in the territory.

The Gaza offensive, which Israel says is intended to quash rocket salvoes fired by militants and destroy cross-border tunnels used to stage attacks, has been the deadliest in the territory since Israeli settlers and soldiers left in 2005.

More than 1 800 Palestinians have been killed, including hundreds of civilians, said Gaza health ministry spokesman Ashraf al-Qedra. Sixty-seven have been killed on the Israeli side, 64 of them soldiers.

Israel has been reducing troop levels, but the violence has not let up. The health ministry in Gaza said yesterday that an eight-year-old girl was killed in an Israeli airstrike in Gaza City and 15 people were wounded. The Israeli army said it was checking the report.

The cost to civilian lives in Gaza has sparked outrage again this week. Israel was criticised yesterday by the US and UN over a strike that killed 10 Palestinians near a UN shelter.

The US was "appalled by today's disgraceful shelling", Jen Psaki, a state department spokeswoman, said in a statement yesterday.

Since the operation began Hamas and other Gaza militant groups have fired more than 3200 rockets at Israeli towns and have staged armed raids against Israel through tunnels and by sea. Israel has hit 4600 targets and uncovered more than 30 tunnels, according to the army.

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