Eyewitness Recounts Mitzpe Yosef Shooting

Jerusalem, 2 July, 2024 (TPS) -- An Israeli man was hospitalized with mild injuries from a shooting attack near Shechem (Nablus) on Tuesday.

A group of tourists from the Israeli city of Raanana were on Mount Gerizim, at the Mitzpe Yosef overlook with views of Shechem and the tomb of the biblical figure Joseph. A shot was fired, hitting one of the tour group participants between the abdomen and chest.

According to an initial assessment, the shot was fired by a sniper from further up Mount Gerizim.

Tour guide Menachem Ben Shahar recounted the incident.

“We were here at the Mitzpe Yosef with a group of visitors, and just as I finished speaking one of the visitors shouted ‘aieee’ and fell. We approached him and checked if he had a wound that looked like an entrance hole. We mobilized forces and it took a relatively long time for them to arrive,” Ben Shahar said.

“There are tens of thousands of terrorists in Nablus, if we don’t destroy them it will explode in our faces,” Ben Shahar added.

“The incident happened just as I finished telling the group about Yosef the righteous, about his loyalty to the land, about his faith,” he said. “Unfortunately, Yosef was thrown into a pit, alone, and we cannot come to visit him — only sometimes like thieves in the night.”

He was referring to restrictions on Jewish worshipers from visiting the tomb. Shechem is under the administrative and security jurisdiction of the Palestinian Authority but the holy site is under Israeli security control. Once a month, Jews are allowed to visit the tomb with a heavy armed escort. For security reasons, the visits always take place at night.

Palestinians frequently set up barricades in Shechem and attack the convoy of pilgrims with gunfire, firebombs and stones.