Israeli father and son killed in Palestinian terror shooting in Huwara

Shai Silas Nigrekar, 60, and Aviad Nir, 28, were pronounced dead at the scene in the terror hotbed town.

By Meir Dolev, World Israel News

A shooting attack took the lives of two Israeli men, a father and son, in the Palestinian terror town of Huwara on Saturday.

The victims, identified as Shai Silas Nigrekar, 60, and his son Aviad Nir, 28, were residents of Ashdod. The victims had reportedly been in Huwara for several hours, running personal errands, prior to the attack.

They had taken their car to a carwash when a terrorist approached on foot. The victims were standing beside their car when he opened fire with a handgun before fleeing the scene. A manhunt was launched.

The Magen David Adom ambulance service reported immediate resuscitation attempts upon their arrival, but both men were declared dead on site.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu extended his condolences to the victims’ family. “Security forces are redoubling efforts in order to apprehend the murderer and bring him to account,” he said in a statement.

He expressed his condolences to the families of the victims “whose lives were cut short in such a cruel and abhorrent way over Shabbat.”

President Isaac Herzog also expressed his grief and stressed that terror should not prevail. “We mustn’t allow terror to win.”

Defense Minister Yoav Gallant held an assessment with top officials from the IDF and Israel’s Security Agency, the Shin Bet.

The IDF usually reduces its presence in Huwara on Saturdays, because most settlements in the area are populated by observant Jews.

Huwara, near Nablus in Samaria, has been a hotbed of Palestinian terror for decades.

Less than a month ago, an Israeli bus was hit by at least eight bullets in another terror shooting while driving through the town.

July also saw an Israeli driver lightly injured by glass shards when his vehicle was hit by at least a dozen bullets in a shooting attack near the Palestinian-controlled town. A day earlier, two Israeli soldiers were wounded when a terrorist rammed them with his vehicle in Huwara.

A month earlier, an Israeli soldier was lightly wounded in a Palestinian stabbing attack in Huwara. A day later, a pregnant woman miraculously escaped her car after it flipped over during a terror attack.

A month-long period prior to that saw another three terror attacks there.

At the end of February, two Israeli brothers, Hallel and Yagel Yaniv, were murdered in a drive-by shooting, prompting a riot by Jewish Israelis later that evening.  A poll later found that almost three-quarters of Palestinians supported their murder.

Two weeks later, former U.S. Marine David Stern was shot while driving through the town with his young children family. After being shot at at point blank range, Stern, a martial arts instructor, managed to shoot and neutralize the terrorist.

A week and a half after that, two IDF soldiers were wounded in a shooting attack in the Palestinian town.