Ben Sales and Cnaan Liphshiz of JTA report:
JERUSALEM — Torched synagogue in Lod. Fires in Haifa. Eight hospitalized in Holon. Ben Gurion Airport closed.
Exchanges of fire continued in Israel and Gaza on Wednesday, May 12, with mounting casualties, while Arab Israelis took to the streets in protests across Israel, with some turning violent.
The Maoz military prep yeshiva in Lod was set on fire on May 11. (Eitan Elhadez-Barak/TPS)
In the central Israeli city of Lod, a state of emergency was declared after Arab protesters burned a synagogue, shops and cars.
Lod has both Arab and Jewish residents. A crowd of Arab protesters burned and trashed a synagogue, along with burning shops and cars.
Arab-Israeli protests also took place in other cities, including the northern port city of Haifa, where videos circulating on social media showed fires burning as well.
Also in Lod, an Arab Israeli man was shot dead, allegedly by an armed Jewish Israeli man who was placed under arrest.
In an unusual move, Israeli border police were called from the West Bank to Lod to stem the protests.
Twelve police were injured in the violent incidents, in which rioters threw rocks, launched fireworks, threw Molotov cocktails, burned trash cans and vandalized and damaged infrastructure.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu arrived in Lod in the early hours of Wednesday and said Israel “will not tolerate” the unrest. He declared a state of emergency,
A video of a crowd of Jewish Israelis beating someone presumed to be an Arab in a Tel Aviv suburb on Wednesday night, May 12, was broadcast live on Israeli TV as some Israelis retaliated against the Arab-Israeli violence unleashed on Israelis.
The incident in the coastal city of Bat Yam, caught by a camera operator for Israeli Channel 11, comes amid the deadly rocket fire launched by Hamas and responded to by Israel.
The footage shows the Jewish Israelis surrounding the man and beating him. Later he is seen lying on the ground wearing a motorcycle helmet being kicked and hit before the camera pans away.
Police did not appear to be on the scene. Channel 11 reported that the man was hospitalized.
Several Israelis have been hospitalized since the beginning of Ramadan due to attacks by Israelis Arabs.
The retaliatory attack happened amid a night of unrest across Israel as Hamas continued to fire salvos of rockets at Israel and Israel bombed Gaza.
There appears to be unprecedented interethnic violence in Israel, as the first and second intifadas were a series of Arab terrorist bombings and lynchings. Some 1,000 Israelis were murdered in the second intifada, 2000-2005.
Jewish protesters in Bat Yam, as well as the northern cities of Tiberias and Acre, marched through the streets, and footage circulating on social media captured crowds of men in multiple locations chanting “Death to Arabs” and vandalizing Arab-owned businesses.
In response to Jewish-Arab confrontations, President Reuven Rivlin said: “I beg you all: Do whatever you can to stop this terrible thing happening before our eyes. We are dealing with a civil war for no reason. Stop this insanity. Please stop. We are one country.”
The seven Israeli fatalities due to rocket fire have all occurred since Tuesday. A Jewish Israeli man was killed on the Gaza border by an anti-tank missile fired by Hamas. A rocket fired from Gaza killed two Arab Israelis, a father and daughter, outside Lod on Tuesday. Earlier, a Jewish Israeli woman was killed by a rocket attack in Rishon LeTzion, and two others were killed in a strike on the southern city of Ashkelon. On Wednesday, five-year-old Ido Avigal of Sderot was killed by rocket fire.
More than 100 rockets were shot at the Tel Aviv area, and traffic was stopped at Ben-Gurion Airport due to the rocket fire.
Yaakov Lappin of JNS reports:
JERUSALEM — A heavy rocket barrage fired by Gazan terror factions at central Israel killed an Israeli woman in Rishon Letzion and injured more than 20 civilians in multiple locations.
Police and rescue personnel at the scene of a building in Rishon Letzion that was directly hit by a rocket fired May 11 from the Gaza Strip, leaving one Israeli dead. (Noam Revkin Fenton/Flash90)
In Holon, eight people were injured and taken to hospital, two in serious condition, said Israeli paramedics. Five civilians sustained light injures in Givatayim, east of Tel Aviv.
“United Hatzalah volunteers treated a bus driver who was seriously injured by a rocket that exploded near his bus in Holon, as well as six other people who suffered light injuries,” United Hatzalah emergency service said in a statement.
The Israel Police said three rocket impact hits were found in Rishon Letzion. The Wolfson Medical Center in Holon received 18 wounded people, two in serious condition from the rocket attack on that city.
The Ichilov Medical Center in Tel Aviv received eight wounded people, one with moderate wounds and the remainder with light injuries, Ynet reported.
Video footage taken by Tel Aviv residents showed dozens of Iron Dome interceptors striking rockets as they flew overhead.
Hamas claimed that it had fired some 130 rockets at Tel Aviv.
“Now, in fulfillment of our promise, the Al-Qassam Brigades has launched the largest missile strike on Tel Aviv and its environs, with 130 missiles, in response to the enemy’s targeting of civilian high-rises,” said Hamas.
Earlier in the day, two female residents of Ashkelon were killed by Palestinian rocket fire on Tuesday after their homes sustained direct hits.
Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad intensified and expanded the range of rocket fire throughout the day, firing further north towards Ashdod. The terror factions have fired some 480 rockets at Israel since Monday evening, reported the Israeli Defense Forces, of which 150 exploded inside Gaza.
The Iron Dome air-defense system intercepted 200 of the rockets heading for populated areas.
Hamas has called their military operation “Sword of Jerusalem.” The Israeli government calls its military operation “Guardian of the Walls.”
