This story is developing.
Four people were killed and four seriously injured in a shooting at Sarona Market, a fashionable new food and retail shopping center in Tel Aviv.
The two gunmen who carried out the apparent terror attack were disarmed, according to the police. One was shot by police and taken to a hospital, according to reports; the other is in custody.
The Magen David Adom rescue service said it took nine victims to Tel Aviv hospitals. One is said to be in critical condition, and four others are in serious condition.
Khaled Abu Toameh, the Jerusalem Post's Palestinian affairs reporter, wrote on Twitter that Palestinians celebrated the shooting in Hebron and Tulkarem in the West Bank.
Meanwhile, 48 News, an Arabic news network based in East Jerusalem, reported that Palestinians in Istanbul lauded the attack by handing out sweets.
Ismail Haniyyeh, a leader of Hamas in the Gaza Strip, tweeted a picture purportedly from the attack, with a caption referring to the terrorists as a heroes and calling for mercy on their souls.
Quds News Network, a Palestinian news organization, reported on Twitter that Israeli forces were gathering near the entrance to Yatta, the village south of Hebron where the suspects are reported to have come from.
Roi Shivek, a tech entrepreneur who lives in Holon, south of Tel Aviv, was taking a cooking class at the Culinary Hub in Sarona Market when he started hearing gunshots from about 60 feet away.
After the first two shots, he thought it might be the sound of firecrackers.
“I think around the fifth shot it was pretty obvious that it’s a terrorist attack,” Shivek said.
Immediately, people began running and screaming.
“We all hid behind the counter,” he said. “Some of the people ran inside the kitchen. Someone locked the door, and that’s it. We just waited on the floor for something to happen.”
When the crowd heard police sirens, he said, they felt safe to exit the shop. Stepping out into the market, he found a swarm of police officers, border police and first responders. As soon as it became apparent that there was a potential bomb threat, bystanders began running south towards Ha’Arba’a Street.
“All OK here in Jerusalem,” Evan Kent, formerly the cantor at Temple Isaiah in Los Angeles, who made aliyah to Israel, said on Facebook.
Kent, a faculty member at Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion in Jerusalem, said in an interview with the Journal that he expects Israelis will continue to lead regular lives despite Wednesday night’s attack.
“One thing I’ve noticed. Israelis, and maybe I'll put myself among them, we’re pretty strong and tough. It [violence] doesn’t deter us, people will be at Sarona tomorrow, shopping, buying food for dinner. They know they can’t succumb to the will of terrorists,” Kent, who lives in the Jerusalem neighborhood of Talbiya with his husband, Rabbi Donald Goor, said. “Israel wont let that happen.”
The two moved to Israel almost three years ago. Do incidents such as these make him second-guess his decision to relocate to the Jewish state? Kent said not in the slightest.
“We live in a very strange and bizarre world. You could have been on the UCLA campus last week; you could have been in San Bernardino nine months ago. I think we live in a crazy world, in Jerusalem I feel remarkably safe. It’s a strange thing to say, we always sort of comment we feel very, very safe, and then things like this happen, but things like this happen in many parts,” he said. “I think Israel is under a
microscope, the chances of getting shot in Chicago are far greater than anything to happen here, and, at same time, it is an emotional and psychological toll that takes place.”
An eyewitness told Israel Radio the gunmen were dressed up as Charedi Orthodox men.
A popular retail and dining hub, Sarona Market was in April cited for security and safety violations. According to The Jerusalem Post, the problems — including the way security guards were inspecting visitors at the entrance — were corrected within 24 hours.
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