‘Work accident’? Jordanian who stabbed Jewish co-worker yelled ‘Allahu Akbar’

Witnesses say the assailant yelled “Allahu Akhbar” as he stabbed his Jewish coworker in a Petah Tikva car repair shop.

By Batya Jerenberg, World Israel News

A Jordanian citizen legally in Israel is now suspected of carrying out a terrorist attack Thursday in the Petah Tikvah car repair shop where he was employed after eyewitnesses said he yelled “Allahu Akhbar” while stabbing his Jewish coworker.

The initial call for help defined the morning incident as a “work accident.” According to an initial police statement, the two men had been arguing before the Jordanian employee, working legally in Israel, speared the 30-year-old Jewish nephew of the owner with a pole. Other employees said that the assailant screamed “Allahu Akhbar [God is great]!” during the assault, which is a typical cry Islamic terrorists utter while attacking Jews.

MDA medics who were called to the scene stopped the bleeding and rushed the victim to hospital in serious condition.

The repair shop owner, Moshe Yamin, told Ynet soon after the attack that the perpetrator had been there for about six months and had “proper working papers.” He hadn’t seen the attack in which the employee stabbed his nephew “with a knife” after an argument, he said, but after he ran over to protect his nephew from further injury, the Jordanian just shoved him and didn’t try to attack him as well.

“I was shocked, he stabbed him in the chest, in the shoulder and another stab,” he told Maariv separately, while crying. “I immediately blocked the stab wound in the shoulder,” he said, showing his hands covered in blood.

Yamin said that he heard the man shouting “Allahu Akhbar” and that he was “going wild” before the police arrived. Ynet reported a conflicting report from a different eyewitness, who said the suspect was shouting “Yalla, yalla [Come on, come on].”

The victim’s father and shop co-owner, Eli Yamin, told Maariv that the Jordanian was talking strangely the day before, “saying all kinds of incomprehensible statements. I thought he was under pressure, I had a conversation with him to calm him down.” Then he got the call from his brother, saying the Jordanian had stabbed his son “with a knife he took from the kitchen.”

In a video clip aired on Hebrew news sites, two policemen can be seen with guns drawn on the man, yelling at him to drop to his knees. The man remains standing and shouting in Arabic, repeatedly waving one hand in the air and then the other, until one officer shoots him with a Taser and he falls immediately to the ground.

He was then handcuffed and taken in for questioning. While police have said that there had already been bad blood between the two workers, which led to the incident, the Shabak security service is now involved in the investigation due to the suspected nationalist angle. The suspect’s mental condition is also being evaluated.