By Tzvi Lev/TPS

Jerusalem (TPS) – Shuki Gilboa served as a volunteer on the Kiryat Arba security team and was seriously injured while responding to the terror attack on June 30 in which 13-year-old Hallel Yaffa Ariel was killed.

“It took time for the IDF to arrive,” Gilboa recounted during an interview with Tazpit Press Service (TPS). “Our security team was the first on the scene as we all live close by.”

Gilboa was on the way to meet his wife when he received an urgent notification from the Kiryat Arba security team that an Arab was spotted climbing the fence and was inside Kiryat Arba. Gilboa picked up his M16 rifle and ran to the Kiryat Arba Yeshiva High School, which he assumed to be the most likely target of a potential terrorist attack.

After arriving at the school and understanding that it was secure, he began to search the surrounding area in coordination with the rest of the security team. During the search, another member of the security team heard strange noises coming from the Ariel house.

As the security team was about to enter the house, Hallel’s father, Rabbi Amichai Ariel, arrived and entered the house with Shuki and Chanoch Kahane, another member of the security team. Rabbi Ariel immediately ran to the children’s bedroom where Hallel was sleeping and found his daughter lying in a pool of blood with multiple stab wounds.

Gilboa heard Rabbi Ariel scream, “They killed her!” and realized that the terrorist was still in the house.

“I realized that the terrorist was still inside,” Gilboa told TPS. “I turned to report it on the radio when I noticed a black image out of the corner of my eye.”

The “black image” was in fact the terrorist hiding in Hallel’s bedroom who then attacked Gilboa. Chanoch Kahane then ran into the room and fired two shots at the terrorist, the first of which hit the terrorist in the back and the second entered Gilboa’s head above his ear and exited through his left eye.

Gilboa remained fully conscious and was evacuated to Hadassah Ein Kerem Hospital in Jerusalem, where doctors worked feverishly to save his eye but to no avail. Gilboa lost all sight in his left eye and will have to use a prosthesis for the rest of his life.

Gilboa was amazed to receive support from people of all walks of life after suffering the injury.

“The support I received was incredible,” he said. “So many people came to visit me, people whom I did not even know.”

“The commander of IDF Central Command visited, along with three government ministers,” he continued. “People who do not even live in Israel, people who just happened to be in Israel at the time, visited me in the hospital.”

Gilboa, who had served in the elite Sayeret Matkal unit and has trained community security teams since his army service, emphasized the crucial importance of the communal security team.

“Today, the citizens are the ones who engage the terrorists,” he stressed. “We are the first line of defense and we are the first to respond 90% of the time.”

“The fact that we do not have quality equipment or training is a very serious issue,” he added. “We are the first on the scene, yet we have extremely shoddy gear and almost never train.”

Gilboa also expressed how disappointed he was in the media coverage of the story.

“When they broadcasted Hallel’s funeral on television, they showed a split screen that featured the terrorists’ joyful mother, who was celebrating her son becoming a martyr. It sends a message of weakness,” he contended. “There should have been a split screen of the terrorist’s house being demolished without any petitions to the Supreme Court. Only then will the world respect us.”

Gilboa’s wife, Shlomit, is an operating room medic at Shaare Zedek Hospital in Jerusalem, which Gilboa says is a great help since she understands all the medical terminology, but he admits that the rehabilitation process is difficult. “I have been in a lot of pain and there are new things I have to get used to,” he said. “It can mean sleepless nights and it isn’t easy.”

An unidentified assailant went on a rampage in Heidingsfield, Germany swinging an axe and brandishing a knife at passengers on a train late Monday night.

At least 21 people were injured in the attack on the train line between Wurzburg-Heidingsfeld and Ochsenfurt, which was closed down by police shortly after.

Three of the victims were seriously injured; one sustained minor wounds. At least 14 others suffered traumatic shock, according to a report by the BBC.

The attacker was shot and killed as he tried to flee the scene, apparently by security personnel, according to a German police spokesperson.

The attacker was described in a tweet by the ZDF national broadcaster as a 17-year-old Afghan teenager; no terror group has taken responsibility for the attack.

The train guard describes, in his own words, how he captured the terrorist who was going to explode a bomb on the Jerusalem Light Rail:

(Video at the bottom of the article)

“As I’m watching the entrance to the train, I saw a man wearing a hat, glasses, a knapsack on his back, leaning on the wall and he’s scanning the train station left and right.

I approached the man, and questioned him, I said something wasn’t right.

I asked him to put down his knapsack.

He refused.

I immediately spun the man around, using reasonable force, I placed him against the wall, and checked him.

I took the knapsack off him, and saw a small bag inside. I lifted the bag up and saw the bomb.

I immediately knocked him down onto the ground.

A police sapper continues the story:

Two civilians approached me, they said there is a terrorist.

I ran to Yafo street and I saw the train guards who yelled there’s a terrorist, who was already on the ground, with guns pointed at him.

I understood there was a knapsack and inside was a pipe bomb. I moved everyone away…

The reaction of the train guards, who got there quickly, and the police, we cordoned off the area, and worked orderly to deal with the bomb.

The police released a statement detailing the attempted terror attack this morning at the Jerusalem Light Rail:

At 9 AM on Sunday, a Jerusalem Light Rail a guard protecting the train station at the corner of Yafo and King George Street noticed a young man standing behind the train station holding a bag, and he looked suspicious.

The guard approached him to check his bag, and found inside an improvised explosive device.

The guard acting professionally and responsibly quickly moved the civilians away who were standing nearby, detained the terrorist and called the police.

Within minutes a large number of police officers arrived, moved the civilians away and closed the streets. Simultaneously, sappers began neutralizing the bomb.

Three pipe bombs were found inside the bag, connected to an ignition wire, a cellphone, and knives.

The sappers neutralized the bombs and removed them from the area.

The terrorist, a resident of the territories [Palestinian Authority], was arrested and sent to interrogation.

The Jerusalem Police Chief said, “The professional actions of the municipal guard prevented a major terror attack against innocent civilians as well as tremendous damage.”

A security force comprised of IDF, Border Guard and police, that had raided and captured a weapons making facility in the town of Al-Ram, north-east of Jerusalem, identified a speeding vehicle that was approaching them in a manner that suggested a terrorist intent. The force, which felt that their lives were at risk, opened fire. One of the passengers in the ramming vehicle was killed and another injured. A third man was arrested and taken for a Shabak interrogation.

{Originally posted to the author’s website My Right Word}

Thank you, Muthana Najar:

Oh, note: no Israel:

Ah, to be a child having “fun” in Gaza.

The Jerusalem District Court on Monday entenced of Bilal Abu Ghanem of Jabal village, a 14-year-old terrorist convicted of involvement in a stabbing attack on bus passengers in Jerusalem’s Armon Hanatziv area last October, to three cumulative life sentences plus 60 years. The attack resulted in the murder of Alon Gobbrg, Haim Habib and Richard Leikin HY”D. The other attacker was killed by security forces.

The terrorist, who was 13 at the time of the attack, was convicted last May of two counts of attempted murder and one count of possession of a knife. The defense argued that the boy did not carry out the actual stabbing and was only involved “to scare Jews.”

The court did not accept the argument that scaring Jews was an appropriate leisure activity for youths and convicted the boy of the charges.