Rioting Palestinians clashed with Israeli police in several locations across East Jerusalem Wednesday night and early Thursday, as forces continued to hunt for a Palestinian suspected of a deadly shooting attack on a checkpoint days earlier.
Protesters hurled rocks and Molotov cocktails, launched fireworks and set tires and garbage dumpsters on fire in several neighborhoods, blocking roads as they faced off against Border Police officers deployed in Palestinian areas of the capital.
Two officers were lightly injured from what authorities suspected was shrapnel from pipe bombs hurled at them in Issawiya, Jerusalem police said.
Earlier in the evening, police said Palestinian gunmen opened fire at a Border Police position at the Qalandia crossing near Jerusalem, without causing any injuries. Troops stationed in the area returned fire and were searching for the suspects who fired from the nearby town.
Police said earlier that five people were arrested during the rioting, which came amid rocketing tensions in the capital and the West Bank, where sporadic clashes were also reported Wednesday night. Earlier on Wednesday, a Palestinian teenager was shot dead by Israeli forces during clashes with troops near Hebron, and on Tuesday, an Israeli soldier was killed in a shooting near Nablus.
There have been several days of rioting in Shuafat, where Israeli forces have imposed a closure since Saturday night following a shooting attack at a nearby checkpoint that killed a Border Police officer and severely wounded a civilian guard. The gunman is thought to have fled into the refugee camp.
The fighting appeared to spread across Palestinian areas of the city Wednesday following a general strike held by the city’s Palestinian residents to protest the manhunt and closure.
The rioting, some of the heaviest the city has seen in over a year, came as Jewish Israelis were celebrating the Sukkot holiday, which generally draws thousands of visitors to Jerusalem and its Old City, oftening raising tensions with Palestinian residents.
In Beit Hanina, stone-throwers broke the windows of a car carrying a Jewish family, forcing them to flee the area.
The father of the family told the Ynet news site that they had been on their way to visit Rachel’s Tomb in Bethlehem when he made a wrong turn and was instead set upon by an angry mob.
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