Julian Borger
The Guardian / September 9, 2024
Triple shooting on mostly quiet border with Jordan may be indicative of Gaza war spreading violence across region
Three Israeli security guards have been killed at a border crossing between the West Bank and Jordan when a Jordanian truck driver opened fire on them, in a fresh sign that the nearly year-old Gaza conflict is spreading violence across the region.
On the same day, an Israeli airstrike in northern Gaza killed a senior aid official and two women and two children from his family.
The West Bank border shooting took place on Sunday at the Allenby Bridge crossing over the River Jordan, also known as the King Hussein Bridge.
The Israeli military said: “A terrorist approached the area of the Allenby Bridge from Jordan in a truck, exited the truck, and opened fire at the Israeli security forces operating at the bridge.
“The terrorist was eliminated by the security forces, three Israeli civilians were pronounced dead as a result of the attack.”
Jordan said it had opened an investigation into the triple shooting and that the border crossing had been closed. A spokesperson for the Jordanian foreign ministry, spokesman for the ministry, Dr Sufyan al-Qudah, said initial investigations suggested that the shooting was an individual act. The statement added that Jordan “rejected and condemned violence and targeting civilians for any reason”.
According to family members, the gunman was a 39-year-old truck driver who came from the influential Huwaitat tribe in southern Jordan.
Israeli reports said the shooting was carried out at close range in a commercial section of the border crossing, where trucks from Jordan and the Gulf go to unload for onward transport into the occupied West Bank and Israel. The border has been largely quiet since Israel and Jordan signed a peace treaty in 1994.
In Gaza, the civil defence group, which fights fires and rescues people trapped in rubble, said its deputy director for northern end of the strip, Mohammed Morsi, had been killed in an airstrike. The organization said four members of his family also died in the bombing of Morsi’s house in the urban Jabaliya refugee camp, north-east of Gaza City. There was no immediate comment from the Israel Defense Forces (IDF).
Israel said it had closed all three of its land border crossings with Jordan and the Israeli army was also reported to have cordoned off the West Bank city of Jericho, which is close to the Allenby Bridge crossing, in case other would-be attackers had already entered.
Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, described the gunman as “an abhorrent terrorist”.
“We are surrounded by a murderous ideology led by Iran’s axis of evil,” he said in a statement issued at the start of a cabinet meeting.
There has been a surge in violence in the West Bank, involving army raids on Palestinian towns and frequent and increasing attacks by Israeli settlers. In recent days there has also been a sharp rise in the number of attacks on Israeli settlers and security forces, including two car bombs and one attempted car bombing.
The increasing bloodshed in the West Bank comes as the Gaza war enters its twelfth month, with the estimated Palestinian death toll approaching 41,000. The conflict was triggered by a surprise Hamas attack on southern Israel on 7 October 2023, in which about 1,200 Israelis were killed.
Since the outbreak of the Gaza war, 650 Palestinians have been killed in the West Bank amid army raids and settler attacks. About 12 Israelis have died in fighting or attacks there over the same period, six of them in the past eight days.
The US, Egypt and Qatar have been trying to broker a ceasefire deal between Hamas and Israel for several months but negotiations are mired, mostly in a dispute over whether, or for how long, Israel can keep a residual force in a strategic corridor along Gaza’s border with Egypt.
Julian Borger is The Guardian‘s world affairs editor based in Washington
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Three Israelis shot dead at crossing between Jordan and occupied West Bank
Holly Evans
The Independent / September 9, 2024
The attacker was also killed with Jordan opening an investigation into the incident.
Three Israeli men have been shot dead at a border crossing between the occupied West Bank and Jordan, Israeli officials have said.
It was the first attack of its kind along the border with Jordan since 7 October, when Hamas carried out an attack on southern Israel, sparking a new phase in the Israel-Palestine conflict in Gaza that has since escalated throughout the region.
The Israeli military said the gunman had approached the Allenby Bridge crossing in a truck from the Jordanian side, before exiting the vehicle and opening fire.
The attacker was “eliminated” during the shootout, while three Israeli men, all in their 50s, were pronounced dead.
An official said that those killed had been security guards who were not part of the army or police.
The truck has since been searched for explosives, with Jordan saying they are investigating the shooting. The border point has been closed from both sides. The Western-allied Arab country made peace with Israel in 1994 but is deeply critical of its policies toward the Palestinians. Jordan has a large Palestinian population and has seen mass protests against Israel over the war in Gaza.
A Jordanian border official told Reuters that at least two dozen Jordanian truck drivers had been detained in the offloading area by Israel’s military for questioning.
Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu condemned the attack and linked it to Israel’s larger conflict with Iran and allied militant groups, including Hamas and Hezbollah in Lebanon.
At the start of a cabinet meeting, he sent his condolences to the victims’ families and said: “A loathsome terrorist murdered three of our citizens in cold blood at the Allenby Bridge.”
The Allenby Bridge over the Jordan River, also known as the King Hussein Bridge, is mainly used by Palestinians and international tourists, as well as for cargo shipments.
It lies about halfway between Amman and Jerusalem, and is the only entry point to the West Bank that does not go through Israel.
The Hamas attack on 7 October killed some 1,200 people, mostly civilians. Another 250 people were abducted and taken into Gaza. Hamas and other militant groups are still holding around 100 after releasing most of the rest in exchange for Palestinians imprisoned by Israel during a week-long ceasefire last November. Around a third of the remaining hostages inside Gaza are believed to be dead.
In the wake of the Gaza conflict, the West Bank has also seen a surge of violence, with near-daily military arrest raids being carried out in dense Palestinian residential areas.
There has also been a rise in violence between Israeli settlers and Palestinians.
On Sunday in northern Gaza, an Israeli airstrike killed a senior aid official and four members of his family, who had been living in the urban Jabaliya refugee camp.
Mohammed Morsi, who was the deputy director of northern Gaza’s civil defence group, died in the attack alongside two women and two children.
Also on Sunday, loved ones mourned Aysenur Ezgi Eygi, an American-Turkish woman who was shot dead on Friday in the West Bank.
She had been demonstrating against Israeli settlements there. The White House has said it was “deeply disturbed” and called on Israel to investigate, while her family seeks an independent investigation.
Since the outbreak of violence in Gaza, more than 600 Palestinians have been killed in the West Bank amid army raids and settler attacks.
Meanwhile, over 40,000 Palestinians have died inside the besieged enclave, while an estimated 90 per cent of Gaza’s population of 2.3 million people have been displaced.
Ceasefire negotiations led by the United States, Qatar and Egypt have spent months trying to broker a deal and the return of the hostages taken by Hamas, but neither side have been able to agree on terms.
Holly Evans is a news reporter based in London
