Palestinian driver goes on rampage in Jerusalem
JERUSALEM – A Palestinian man commandeered a construction vehicle Thursday on a major road and swung a police car into the air, smashing it against a bus before bystanders opened fire on him and police shot him dead.
The incident, the third of its kind in the past year, came a day after the latest U.S. visit to push Israel’s hawkish future leaders into another try at Mideast peacemaking.
The two officers inside the police car escaped with slight injuries, police said. The bus, which was parked at an intersection, was empty.
Video footage from a traffic surveillance camera showed a front-end loader scoop up the car with its shovel, hurl it into the air and slam it against the bus. Police and bystanders opened fire at the driver, and the vehicle crashed to a stop against an electricity pole.
Police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld identified the driver as Mar’i al-Rdaidah, a 26-year-old from east Jerusalem. It wasn’t clear whether the man was affiliated with a militant group, Rosenfeld said.
“It is without a doubt a terror attack,” Jerusalem’s deputy police chief, Nisso Shachar, told reporters.
Israeli government spokesman Mark Regev called the rampage a “senseless act of violence against innocent civilians.”
Shachar said an open copy of the Quran, Islam’s holy book, was found inside the front-end loader. The book’s presence could indicate the attacker was influenced by Islamic radicals, though many Muslims routinely carry the Quran.
Hmmm. Goes to show how effective a well-armed populace can be in bringing events like this to a quick conclusion. Imagine the destruction if there had been no armed bystanders.
Until I read that last paragraph I would have thought he was a disgruntled Lutheran or Episcopalian.
