At least three people have been injured slightly this Monday in a car hit and failed shooting attempt, allegedly perpetrated by two 17-year-old Palestinians, near the central bus station in Jerusalem, as reported in a statement by the Police Force.

“Immediately after (the attack), two terrorists got out of the vehicle armed with a ‘Carlo’ type weapon [un subfusil casero] and they tried to open fire without success,” details the note, which adds that the weapon jammed and the attackers threw the machine gun on the road to escape.

The accident occurred in the Mordechai Tekhelet Street, in the Romema neighborhood of East Jerusalem, just over a kilometer from the central bus station. The Palestinians claim this part of the city as their capital, but it is controlled by the Israeli Army.

Two 17-year-old Palestinians arrested

A few hours later, the Police reported the arrest as suspects of two 17-year-old Palestinians from Hebron, a city in the south of the occupied West Bank, after “extensive searches” carried out by the Border Police and a helicopter. “After their arrest, the two were taken for interrogation,” the Police said, noting that the young people had hidden after the attack in a closed business.

The Israeli emergency service Magen David Adom has stressed that its teams provided medical care to the three injured, with minor injuries to the head and face, and that the two who had been evacuated to the Shaare Tzedek hospital will be discharged this Monday. The victims have been identified as Menachem Mendel Fisch, 20, Yosef Yitzhak Hershenboim, 18, and a 15-year-old boy.

Images from surveillance cameras in the area show the attack and attempted shooting attack. In the video, a car is seen accelerating towards a group of people and then running over them.

In Jerusalem, whose eastern part is militarily occupied by Israel, violent attacks occur quite regularly, such as attempted stabbings or attacks often perpetrated by Palestinians against military checkpoints or Israeli security forces.

Violence in Jerusalem and the West Bank has worsened since Israel began bombing the Gaza Strip after the devastating attack by the Hamas terrorist group on October 7, in which at least 1,400 Israelis died. Palestinian health authorities say more than 34,000 people have died in the Israeli assault.