JERUSALEM— A Palestinian terrorist shot and killed two Israeli brothers, aged 22 and 20, driving through a West Bank town on Sunday, Feb. 26.
A day later, on Monday, an American citizen in his 20s was killed in a Palestinian drive-by shooting near Jericho.
Tom Nides, the US ambassador to Israel, tweeted, “Sadly, I can confirm that a US citizen was killed in one of the terror attacks in the West Bank tonight. I pray for his family.”
The victim was identified as Elan Ganeles, an American-Israeli citizen who graduated from Columbia University in 2022 with a degree in sustainable science and neuroscience.
Terrorists drove up to Ganeles’ car and shot at him and also fired at other cars, according to Israeli reports.
According to TPS, the terrorists fled in the direction of the Aqbat Refugee Camp near Jericho. Along the way, they abandoned and burnt their car, escaping in another vehicle. They encountered police officers who fired on them. One of the other terrorists was apparently wounded before getting away. As of press time, the manhunt for the killers continues.
Ganeles, from Connecticut, came to Israel in 2014 and enlisted in the Israel Defense Forces, then lived on Kibbutz Sde Eliyahu. At the time of his death he was working for Columbia’s Center for International Earth Science Information Network as a spatial analysis.
He is survived by his parents and two brothers and was scheduled to be buried in Israel.
The Israeli victims of the Sunday terror attack, who lived in Har Bracha, were driving Sunday, Feb. 26, through Huwara, a town near the northern West Bank city of Nablus, reports said.
The two victims, brothers Hallel and Yagel Yaniv, ages 22 and 20, were on Route 60, a West Bank thoroughfare that runs through the town. They were both students at academies in which students combine military service with Torah study.
The attack took place as Israeli and Palestinian officials met in Jordan to stem a recent escalation in violence, though what they agreed to later came under debate.
After the Sunday terrorist killings, local Israeli residents living near Huwara rioted in Huwara, burning houses and cars. At least one Palestinian was killed amid the riots.
Videos posted to social media showed widespread fires in Huwara and smoke billowing into the air. One Palestinian was killed in another town, Za’tara, south of Huwara.
Israeli leaders called on the rioters to stop. Late at night, Israeli forces quelled the violence and took control of the area, in addition to helping Palestinians evacuate burning buildings.
The Palestinian terrorist attacks on Feb. 26 and 27 came amid months of escalating violence in Israel and the West Bank.
Fifteen Israelis have been killed this year in Palestinian terror attacks, the vast majority of them civilians.
More than 60 Palestinians have been killed during the same period, mostly in raids by Israeli forces on cells of Palestinian terrorists. A number of Palestinian civilians and children have been killed in the violence.
Haaretz quoted local sources as saying that Sunday’s Palestinian shooter was wearing a shirt with the emblem of the Lion’s Den, a group of terrorists established last year in Nablus as Israel intensified raids in the West Bank following a series of Palestinian stabbing attacks on Israeli civilians.
In a public video, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called the shooting attack a “terrible tragedy” and appealed to the rioters to retreat.
“I ask — even when blood is boiling and emotions run high — not to take the law into one’s hands,” Netanyahu said.
“I ask that the IDF and the security forces be allowed to carry out their work. I remind you that in recent weeks, they have targeted dozens of terrorists and thwarted dozens of attacks.
“Let the IDF complete its pursuit and do not take the law into your hands; together we will defeat terrorism.”
One regional settlement official, Davidi Ben Zion, tweeted and then deleted a call for vengeance, according to screenshots. “The village of Huwara needs to be wiped out today,” he wrote. “Enough with the talk of building and strengthening settlements. The deterrence that was lost needs to return immediately, and there’s no place for mercy.”
Hours later, he tweeted, “To remove any doubt, I will clarify that we are against anarchy and taking the law into one’s hands. We rely on the IDF to do what is needed to return security to our area.”
Bezalel Smotrich, the finance minister who has authority over civilian life in parts of the West Bank controlled by Israel, tweeted to his “settler brothers” that “it is forbidden to take the law into one’s hands and create dangerous anarchy that will likely go out of control and cost human life.”
On Feb. 26, the Israeli and Palestinian officials who met in the Jordanian capital of Amman to tamp down the intensification of violence agreed to resume coordination on security matters between Israel and the Palestinian Authority, which governs West Bank Palestinian population centers.
That meeting was followed by disagreement among the parties as to whether Israel would freeze settlement expansion, a claim Netanyahu denied.
Also in attendance were officials from Jordan, Egypt and the United States.
A joint statement from the parties said both sides agreed to suspend “unilateral measures for a period of three to six months.
“This includes an Israeli commitment to stop discussion of any new settlement units for four months and to stop authorization of any outposts for six months.”
Israel recently authorized nine outposts in retaliation for Palestinian terrorist attacks.
Netanyahu said on Twitter that settlement building would go ahead unhindered. “There is not now nor will there be a freeze,” he wrote.
Despite the apparent contradictions, the Biden administration praised the conference.
“Today’s meeting in Aqaba is a positive step for Israelis and Palestinians,” Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Twitter. “It’s crucial for the parties to follow through on steps to de-escalate tensions and restore calm.”
Separately, the Times of Israel reported that the Cabinet advanced a bill that would impose the death penalty for Palestinians who kill Israelis.
