An 8-year-old boy, seriously injured Friday in a car-ramming attack on a bus stop in East Jerusalem, succumbed to his injuries, the hospital where he had been transferred said on Saturday.
His death brings to three the number of Israeli dead in the attack which occurred on Friday afternoon, in Ramot, a Jewish settlement district in the eastern part – annexed by Israel – of the Holy City.
His brother, Yaakov Yisrael Paley, 6, was killed instantly, and Alter Shlomo Lederman, a 20-year-old yeshiva (Talmudic school) student, also died on Friday shortly after being taken to hospital .
Worrying state of the injured
“During Shabat (the Jewish weekly rest), 8-year-old Asher Menahem Paley, who was seriously injured in the Ramot attack, died,” Shaare Tzedek Hospital in Jerusalem said in a statement.
“He arrived in critical condition (…) Many teams from the trauma unit, emergency, pediatric intensive care, pediatric surgery and neurosurgery fought for many hours to save his life but they unfortunately had to declare his death, ”said the press release.
Among the four injured in the attack are the father of the two slain boys, who is still hospitalized, and their 10-year-old older brother, according to hospital sources and Israeli media.
Attacker shot dead
Police say the driver of a ram-car, a 31-year-old resident of Issawiye, a Palestinian neighborhood in East Jerusalem, aged 31, rammed “at high speed (…) innocent people who were waiting at the bus stop” . He was shot dead by police who arrived quickly on the scene, according to the same source.
Since the beginning of the year, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict has claimed the lives of at least 43 Palestinians (including combatants and civilians, including minors), nine Israeli civilians (including three minors), and one Ukrainian woman, according to an AFP count based on official Israeli and Palestinian sources.