Palestinian shot dead after injuring eight people in car ramming

A Palestinian was shot and killed, and eight people were wounded in a car ramming attack at the entrance of Jerusalem on Monday, Israeli police and media said.

Mickey Rosenfeld said eight people were injured when a "terrorist ran into a bus stop," adding that the Palestinian attacker was shot and critically injured during the attack.

Israeli media later reported that the Palestinian had succumbed to his wounds, identifying him Abdel-Muhsen Hassuneh, 21, from occupied East Jerusalem's Beit Hanina neighborhood.

Of the eight ramming victims, one is in moderate condition and seven were lightly wounded. All are being treated at a hospital in Jerusalem.

On Sunday, Israeli forces shot and seriously injured a Palestinian teenager in the occupied West Bank city of Hebron after an alleged stabbing attempt, locals and the Israeli army said at the time.

An Israeli army spokesperson told Ma’an that “a Palestinian armed with knife attempted to stab a pedestrian in Hebron, when forces on site responded to the threat and shot the assailant.”

Local sources in Hebron identified the teenage girl as 16-year-old Lama Munthir Hafith al-Bakri.

The alleged attacks are the latest to take place in Israel and the occupied Palestinian territory, where an escalation of violence that kicked off in October has continued full-fledged into December.

The recent violence has left at least 118 Palestinians killed by Israeli military and settlers and 19 Israelis killed in attacks carried out by Palestinian individuals.

The circumstances of several deaths since Oct. 1 have been widely disputed by critics who say that Israel has implemented a "shoot-to-kill" policy against Palestinians.

The Executive Director of Israeli rights group B'Tselem, Hagai El-Ad, said last week that the policy is being used against Palestinians who have already been “neutralized" during attacks.

El-Ad said in a statement that Israeli soldiers and police officers effectively became “judge, jury and executioner” after the policy was encouraged by senior Israeli politicians and Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu.

PLO Central Council member Muhammad Eshteyyah in a press conference last week said that 85 percent of Palestinian deaths to take place since Oct. 1 could have been prevented if the “shoot-to-kill” policy was not implemented.