Car rams into Israeli troops; 2 Palestinians shot and killed

JERUSALEM (AP) — The Israeli military said a Palestinian vehicle targeted Israeli soldiers on a highway in the West Bank before dawn on Monday, prompting troops to open fire, killing two Palestinians inside.

An Israeli officer and border policeman were injured when the Palestinian car rammed into a group of Israeli troops, running them over on a road outside a village near the city of Ramallah, the military said. The officer was seriously injured and hospitalized. A third Palestinian inside the car was wounded and taken into custody.

Later Monday, another military statement said an initial inquiry “indicates that the incident was a terror attack” and that the Palestinian suspects had also thrown firebombs at a nearby highway earlier in the night.

A Palestinian official disputed that account. Khaldoun al-Deek, the mayor of the Palestinian village of Nima near where the incident took place, told The Associated Press that the incident took place at a sharp curve in the road, leading him to “believe it was a road accident, not a ramming attack.”

The Palestinian health ministry identified the two killed Palestinians as Amir Daraj and Yusuf Anqawi, both 20 years old and residents of villages near Ramallah.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he had ordered the military to expedite the demolition of the suspected Palestinian attackers’ homes. Israel demolishes Palestinian attackers’ homes as a policy aimed at deterring future attacks.

Since 2015, Palestinians have killed over 50 Israelis in stabbings, shootings and car-ramming attacks, and Israeli forces have killed upwards of 260 Palestinians in that same period.

Israel has described most of the Palestinians killed as attackers, but occasional clashes between protesters and soldiers have also turned deadly.