Teen Terrorist Injures Israeli in Jerusalem

Latest Developments

A Palestinian teenager from eastern Jerusalem stabbed a 64-year-old Jewish man on March 6. The victim, identified as Tzvi Tal, was waiting at a bus stop in Jerusalem’s Neve Yaakov neighborhood when the teenager stabbed him in the back and fled. The Magen David Adom ambulance service took the victim, who sustained moderate injuries, to Hadassah Hospital Mount Scopus. Police tracked down and arrested the assailant shortly after the incident.

The attack follows another stabbing by a Palestinian teenager on March 5 in the northern West Bank. According to the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), the assailant stabbed an Israeli soldier at an army post near the Yitzhar Junction. The 17-year-old attacker, identified by Palestinian media as Muhammad Shehadeh, was shot and killed by other troops. The victim was transported to a hospital in serious condition.

Expert Analysis

“The disturbing phenomenon of children carrying out terror attacks against Israelis is sadly an old story. Unfortunately, several of the latest teen terrorists have become radicalized under Israel’s nose in eastern Jerusalem. To combat terrorism, Israel must radically change the way it deals with education and curricula in its capital.” — Enia Krivine, Senior Director of FDD’s Israel Program and National Security Network

“It’s unfortunate that teenagers are committing acts of terrorism. However, this should not come as a shock, as Palestinian terrorist organizations often manipulate and encourage young individuals to harm innocent civilians solely based on their Jewish identity. Some of these groups go as far as to provide instructional materials on social media platforms to educate Palestinians in the West Bank and eastern Jerusalem on how to murder Jews.” — Joe Truzman, Senior Research Analyst at FDD’s Long War Journal

“Hamas and other terrorist groups unabashedly use and encourage children to attack Israelis. Though many children are killed or injured while carrying out attacks, they are added to overall casualty counts, inflating the number of child deaths and injuries attributed to Israel. Because they are children, there is an implication of innocence that isn’t always accurate.” — David May, FDD Research Manager and Senior Research Analyst

Teens Indoctrinated in Schools

On November 7, a 16-year-old Palestinian teen stabbed and killed 20-year-old American-Israeli police officer Sgt. Elisheva Rose Lublin in Jerusalem’s Old City. On February 5, a 14-year-old Palestinian teen attempted to stab Israeli Border Police officers in the West Bank town of al-Eizariya near eastern Jerusalem before being shot and killed by the officers. Palestinian children have also taken part in fighting Israeli forces during anti-terrorist operations in the West Bank, throwing Molotov cocktails at Israeli forces and often getting killed or injured.

Schools in the West Bank, Gaza, and eastern Jerusalem use the Palestinian Authority (PA) school curriculum to educate more than two million Palestinian children. According to Impact-SE, an international research and policy organization that monitors education around the world, the PA’s reformed curriculum for grades one to 11 is saturated with incitement to violence and glorification of terror against Jews and Israelis. The curriculum promises heavenly rewards for martyrs and calls on Palestinians to sacrifice themselves for their homeland and “redeem it with blood.” The curriculum is also replete with antisemitic tropes — including that Jews manipulate global events — and describes Israel as satanic.

Palestinian Train and Use Child Militants

Palestinian terrorist organizations in the Gaza Strip, West Bank, and Lebanon have actively recruited, trained, and used child militants for years. Hamas’s al-Qassam Brigades and Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) run youth summer camps, which include military training. One video released by PIJ in 2021 shows children as young as 10 training on how to abduct an IDF soldier — despite recruitment posters for the organization claiming that the program is for children between the ages of 14 and 17. The Iran-backed Lebanese terrorist group Hezbollah established a youth movement over three decades ago called the Imam al-Mahdi Scouts, which trains children to use weapons and indoctrinates them with the group’s ideology.

Related Analysis

“Teenaged perpetrators of terror,” by Enia Krivine and Lt. Col. (Ret.) Jonathan Conricus

“Hamas defends its military summer camps for children and teenagers,” by Joe Truzman

“Palestinian Terrorist Attack Near Jerusalem Kills One,” FDD Flash Brief