Six killed, 12 injured in east Jerusalem shooting attack at bus stop

Dubai: Six people were killed and 12 injured in a shooting attack at the Ramot Junction bust stop in Jerusalem, reports said.

Of the injured, seven victims listed in serious condition have been taken to hospitals.

The two assailants have been “neutralised,” news agencies reported officials as saying.

Reports said the Palestinian gunmen opened fire on people waiting at the bus stop.

The shooting took place at a major intersection at the northern entrance to Jerusalem, on a road that leads to Jewish settlements located in east Jerusalem.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visited the Ramot Junction, saying that Israel is in a “mighty war against terror.”

“A mighty war against terror is taking place on all fronts,” the premier says in an address to Israeli media at the site of the attack, offering his condolences to the families of the five victims and wishing a speedy recovery to the injured.

“We are now pursuing and encircling the villages where the terrorists came from,” he said. The two gunmen, both West Bank Palestinians, hail from towns southeast of Ramallah — Qatanna and Al Qubeibah, reports said.

“The fighting continues in the Gaza Strip,” Netanyahu said. Israel “will destroy Hamas as we promised and free our hostages — all of our hostages,” he added.

“Sadly, the war also continues in Jerusalem and in Judea and Samaria, where we have acted with great force,” he says, using the biblical term for the West Bank, adding that “The Shin Bet and the IDF thwarted hundreds [of attacks], and the Israel Police also thwarted hundreds this year.”

“But unfortunately, not this morning,” he said.

The Israeli military said it is encircling Palestinian villages on the outskirts of the nearby West Bank city of Ramallah as it steps up defense in response to the attack.

Palestinian militant group Hamas, which has been at war with Israel in Gaza for nearly two years, praised the attack, saying it was carried out by two Palestinian militants.

“We affirm that this operation is a natural response to the crimes of the occupation and the genocide it is waging against our people,” Hamas said in a statement.

Footage of the attack showed dozens of people fleeing from a bus stop at the busy intersection during the morning rush hour.

Paramedics who responded to the scene said the area was chaotic and covered in broken glass, with people wounded and lying unconscious on the road and a sidewalk near the bus stop.

There was no immediate comment on the attack from Palestinian militant groups.

The war in Gaza has sparked a surge of violence in both the Israeli-occupied West Bank and Israel.

Palestinian militants have attacked and killed Israelis in Israel and the West Bank, while there has also been a rise in settler violence against Palestinians.

While there have been scattered attacks over the past months in Israel, the last deadly mass shooting attack was in October 2024, when two Palestinians from the West Bank opened fire on a major boulevard and light rail station in the Tel Aviv area, killing seven people and leaving many others wounded. Hamas’ military wing claimed responsibility for the attack.

According to police, the two men opened fire in the Jaffa neighborhood of Tel Aviv, including shooting directly into a light rail carriage crowded with passengers that was stopped at a station.

-- With inputs from AP & AFP