2 Palestinians shot dead after allegedly stabbing Israeli soldier in West Bank

Two Palestinians were shot and killed after stabbing an Israeli soldier near Nablus in the West Bank on Sunday, the Israeli military said.

The Palestinians allegedly stabbed and wounded one Israeli soldier in Huwara, 9 km south of Nablus, wounding him lightly, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said in a statement.

Israeli soldiers at the scene fired at the attackers and killed them, and accidently hit another Israeli soldier, wounding him moderately. The two soldiers were evacuated to the Belinson hospital in Petah Tikva, located in central Israel.

This is the second attack to take place on Sunday. Earlier in the day, a 21-year-old Israeli soldier was lightly wounded after he was stabbed near the Jerusalem central bus station.

A security guard took control of the attacker and he was arrested shortly thereafter, Israeli police spokeswoman Luba Samri said in a statement.

Also on Sunday, Israeli security forces arrested a Palestinian woman caught with a knife, suspected of planning to carry out an attack near Ma'ale Shomron, a Jewish settlement in the northern West Bank.

Earlier in the day, the Israeli army said that 12 Palestinians were arrested all over the West Bank in Israeli army raids on their houses, according to the Palestinian Prisoners' Club Association.

Over the weekend, three Palestinians were killed after allegedly carrying out attacks against Israelis.

One Palestinian man was killed after allegedly trying to stab an Israeli policeman in Jerusalem on Saturday, and another Palestinian was shot and killed after allegedly ramming his car into a military post near Nablus, wounding one soldier lightly.

On Friday, a Palestinian woman was shot and killed by Israeli paramilitary border police guards after allegedly trying to run them over in Silwad, a Palestinian town situated 12 km northeast of Ramallah in the West Bank. No Israeli injuries were reported.

Twenty-one Israelis and one U.S. citizen were killed since the start of the current wave of violence in October, in lone wolf stabbing, vehicular and shooting attacks perpetrated by Palestinians.

More than 120 Palestinians have been killed during this period, some during clashes with Israeli security forces while others were gunned down after allegedly trying to commit attacks against Israelis.

The Palestinians and Israeli human right groups charge Israeli security forces and vigilante citizens are using excessive force against Palestinian attackers, as they no longer pose a threat at the scenes of attack.

Israeli leaders blame the Palestinian Authority for incitement to violence due to religious motives, sparked by tensions over the flashpoint holy site of the Al-Aqsa Mosque in east Jerusalem.

The Palestinian Authority charges that the violence is the result of nearly 50 years of Israeli occupation of the West Bank, east Jerusalem and Gaza Strip territories, home to more than five million people, and amid dim prospects of establishing a Palestinian state in these territories, in accordance with the two-state peace solution.

Meantime, Secretary General of Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) executive committee Saeb Erekat on Sunday accused Israel of closing down all doors for the resumption of the stalled peace process in the Middle East.

Erekat told Xinhua that an earlier Israeli media report that the Israeli side rejected a Palestinian proposal to start secret peace talks with Israel on borders "is completely untrue."

"It was just a meeting held with Sivan Shalom, the Israeli deputy prime minister, in August," Erekat said, adding that "in the meeting, I called for resuming the talks based on the principle of the two-state solution."

Peace talks between the two sides, which were sponsored by the United States for nine months, stalled since last year and failed to achieve any significant breakthrough due to differences on border and settlement issues. Endit