Stabbing attack in Jerusalem - 64-year-old man wounded, suspect arrested

Victim thanks God for his survival - ‘The mercy of God’

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A 64-year-old Israeli man sustained light-to-moderate injuries on Wednesday after being stabbed three times in the back while waiting at a bus stop in Jerusalem.

Magen David Adom emergency medical services treated the man at the scene before evacuating him to Hadassah Mount Scopus Hospital for penetrating injuries.

The victim was identified as Rabbi Tzvi Tal, from the Neve Yaakov neighborhood who provided a statement from the hospital.

“I had to go to Atarot, I was waiting at the bus stop, I was talking to my son [by phone]. Suddenly, I feel someone hitting me hard in the back, he ran away but I felt something left on my back, I felt there was a knife there,” he said.

After stabbing him, the youth ran away while Rabbi Tal went into the street to try to flag down a vehicle for help.

“I went down to the road trying to stop a car; no one saw it, maybe they didn't notice,” Tal said. “It took a while for one to stop, I told him, ‘I have a problem, I have a knife in my back, can you take it out for me?’ He helped me.”

Tal said he saw the young Arab man waiting at the bus stop, and assumed he was waiting for the bus.

“I thought he was waiting for the bus, but he was waiting for me,” Rabbi Tal said.

Police and security forces began looking for the attacker, who fled the scene immediately after the incident.

Shortly afterward, the police announced that the suspect, a 14-year-old boy from the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Kafr Aqab, had been apprehended.

The attack came one day after another Palestinian teenager stabbed a soldier near the Yitzhar settlement in northern Judea and Samaria. The teen was shot and killed by other soldiers in the area.

Rabbi Tal said he thanks God and said: “We are sitting on a powder keg, the fact that it doesn't happen every second is because someone is watching over us.”

He said his survival was “by the grace of God.”

The National Security Council has warned Israelis to be even more vigilant with the approach of the month-long Muslim holiday of Ramadan, which begins on Sunday.

“Muslim terrorist organizations see Ramadan as an opportunity to carry out terrorist attacks and violent acts,” the council warned.