Terrorist Attack in Jerusalem

Eli Kay was buried in Jerusalem’s Har HaMenuchot cemetery on Monday afternoon, having been shot dead in the Old City by a Hamas terrorist on Sunday.

He made Aliyah from South Africa in 2016 and studied at a Chabad yeshiva in Kiryat Gat. His friends remember him as an ardent Zionist dedicated to the Jewish people and the land of Israel.

The terrorist was a member of Hamas and fired upon civilians as well as security forces near the entrance of the Temple Mount at about 9 a.m. on Sunday morning. Israeli police responded quickly and killed him at the scene. He has been identified as a 42-year-old resident of East Jerusalem, Fadi Abu Shkhaydam.

Israel’s Public Security Minister, Omer Barlev, said:

“[The gunman] moved through the alleys and fired quite a bit.
Luckily, the alley was mostly empty because otherwise
— heaven forbid — there would have been more casualties.
The entire incident lasted 32 or 36 seconds.”

Shkhaydam opened fire with a submachine gun and wounded three passers-by in addition to Eli Kay. Two members of Israel’s Border Police who responded to the attack suffered light wounds in the brief exchange of fire.

Reports have emerged with a grainy screenshot that say Shkhaydam had disguised himself as an Orthodox Jew.

In the grotesque manner of terrorists, Hamas have claimed ‘credit’ for the attack and said that Shkhaydam was one of the group’s leaders who was based in the Shuafat refugee camp.

Clashes broke out in that camp on Sunday night when hundreds of Palestinians marched through it to ‘honour’ Shkhaydam. Videos circulating on social media show dozens of them hurling rocks at security forces and dodging clouds of tear gas.

Israeli police are said to have raided the neighbourhood earlier in the day and arrested three of Shkhaydam’s relatives.