Brother of Tel Aviv terrorist eliminated in Jenin gun battle

One of the men shot dead in the skirmish was the brother of the terrorist who killed three people in an attack in Tel Aviv in April.

By Batya Jerenberg, World Israel News

Several Palestinian terrorists were killed and wounded Wednesday morning in Jenin after firing on IDF troops targeting the home of the brother of the man who carried out a deadly attack at a café in Tel Aviv in April.

The father and a brother of Ra’ad Hazem have been wanted ever since Hazem had carried out the shooting attack in the trendy Dizengoff neighborhood, killing three and wounding some 14 people. Hazem had fled and was shot dead by Shabak agents at the end of an overnight search after he drew his weapon on them.

The brother, Abd, was suspected of driving Ra’ad from their home in the Jenin refugee camp to the border fence so that he could slip across to commit the attack. Their father, a former commander of the Palestinian National Security service in Nablus (Shechem), was suspected of knowing the plan but not stopping it. He also praised his son’s criminal act after the incident, calling him a shahid, or martyr, for the Palestinian cause.

The two had gone into hiding in the Jenin camp soon afterwards, knowing that Israeli security was looking for them..

Abd and an accomplice, Muhammed Alownah, were recently fingered as top suspects in a string of shooting attacks against Jewish communities in northern Samaria. This included targeting a Defense Ministry tractor working along the border fence some two weeks ago, shattering a window but not hurting its operators.

According to the IDF, they were also planning additional “significant attacks in the near future.”

On Wednesday, IDF forces and members of an undercover Border Police unit surrounded the Hazem family home and called for their surrender.

When he and other terrorists instead fired at the troops and set off a bomb as they tried to enter, the soldiers launched a small, anti-tank missile at the building and shot back. Abed was killed, as was Alownah and another man who was reportedly a member of the Palestinian Authority’s security forces.

In video footage published by Ynet, the third man, later identified as Ahmed Alawneh, can be seen firing his weapon alongside a few other terrorists when he is taken out by an IDF sniper after reportedly being shot in the head.

Palestinian media claimed a fourth person was killed and about nine others were wounded in the exchange of fire.