FIVE ISRAELIS were killed in a terror attack during morning prayers at a Jerusalem synagogue.
Two Palestinian assailants entered a synagogue and rabbinical seminary in the Har Nof neighborhood of western Jerusalem and attacked worshippers at the morning prayer service with a gun, axes and knives.
At least eight worshippers also were injured, some seriously, in the Tuesday morning attack on the Bnei Torah Kehillat Yaakov synagogue. Three of those killed are dual American and Israeli citizens.
One of the victims was Rabbi Mosheh Twersky, who was the head of the kollel at Yeshiva Toras Moshe in Jerusalem.
Twersky, 59, was the son of the late Prof. Isadore Twersky of Harvard University and a grandson of the late Rabbi Joseph Soloveitchik.
The other three victims were Rabbi Avraham Shmuel Goldberg, 68, Rabbi Calman Levine, 55 and Rabbi Aryeh Kopinsky, 43.
The four rabbis were all residents of Har Nof and had made aliyah to Israel in recent years.
Goldberg was a UK citizen while the other three rabbis held US citizenship.
All four were laid to rest on Nov. 18.
Zidan Saif, 30, of the Druze village of Kfar Yanouch in the Galilee, died Tuesday evening from a gunshot wound to the head suffered in a shootout with the two assailants.
YEHUDA Grossbard, an eyewitness, told Tazpit News Agency, My wife heard shots I ran downstairs, and saw people running out of the synagogue, some were covered in blood.
I went next to the synagogue and I heard gunshots, I saw someone outside whose head was full of blood. Then I heard more shots, and thats when the police came.
They told people to get on the ground, and then the terrorists jumped out from the stairs and they shot them there.
Police killed both of the assailants, Ghassan Abu Jamal and Uday Abu Jamal, who have been identified as residents of the eastern Jerusalem neighborhood of Jabel Mukaber.
The assailants were members of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP).
Police reportedly began searching their homes after the attack. Palestinian reports say the assailants, who are cousins, are relatives of terrorists released in the exchange to return Gilad Shalit.
The Hamas and Islamic Jihad terror organizations praised the attack, and said it was in retaliation for the death of a Palestinian Egged bus driver, Youssef Al-Roumani, who was found late Sunday night hanged in his bus at a terminal in Jerusalem. His death was ruled a suicide.
An autopsy Monday at the Abu Kabir Forensic Institute in Tel Aviv found that the death was not criminally related, Israel Police said. The body was returned to the family. However, a Palestinian pathologist said in a separate report that there were signs of violence on his body, and the family said he was killed by settlers.
Hamas called for more such attacks.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called a security consultation for Tuesday afternoon following the attack.
He blamed the attack on incitement led by Hamas and Abu Mazen the nom de guerre of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, and blamed the international community for irresponsibly ignoring such incitement.
We will respond with a heavy hand to the brutal murder of Jews who came to pray and were met by reprehensible murderers, Netanyahu said following the terror attack.
US Secretary of State John Kerry, who is London, called Netanyahu to offer his condolences. This simply has no place in human behavior, Kerry told reporters, and called for Palestinian leaders to condemn the attack.
Jerusalem bows its head in pain and sorrow on this difficult morning. Jerusalem residents peacefully praying in a synagogue in the heart of Jerusalem were cruelly slaughtered in cold blood while wearing their prayer shawls, Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat said in a statement.
We will not surrender to terror. We will stand strong and defend our city from those who try to disturb the peace of our capital.
