Militants fire on Jewish worshippers
Palestinian militants opened fire on a group of Jewish worshippers today when Israeli troops went to evacuate them from a holy site in the West Bank city of Nablus, an Israeli military spokesman said.
No-one was hurt in the incident.
The spokesman said the worshippers were fired on at a site they believe contains the tomb of Joseph, son of the biblical patriarch Jacob. The site has been off-limits to Jews since October 2000, when two Israeli soldiers and 15 Palestinians were killed in fighting there.
The site is in the middle of a neighbourhood of Nablus, the West Bank’s largest Palestinian city, and can be reached only through narrow alleyways.
The military spokesman said that despite a ban on Israeli citizens entering Palestinian-controlled territories in general and the tomb in particular, worshippers sneak in about once a month, and soldiers remove them.
Israeli police spokesman Gil Kleiman said the worshippers were taken to a nearby police station for questioning. He could not say if they would be charged with entering a Palestinian-controlled area without permission.
