The attackers, Palestinians from East Jerusalem, were shot dead by off-duty soldiers and an armed civilian, police said.
Israel’s Shin Bet security agency identified the gunmen as 30- and 38-year-old brothers who were affiliated with Hamas, which runs Gaza.
“The operation came as a natural response to unprecedented crimes conducted by the Occupation (Israel),” it said in a statement, citing the military offensive in Gaza and the treatment of Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails.
Israel’s far-right minister for police, Itamar Ben-Gvir, told reporters at the site of the attack that it “proves again how we must not show weakness, that we must speak to Hamas only through the (rifle) scopes, only through the war.”
Blinken, on his third visit to the region since the war erupted, said Thursday’s shooting was a reminder “of the threat from terrorism that Israel and Israelis face every single day … My heart goes out to the victims of this attack.”
The violence came as Israel and Hamas struck a last-minute agreement on Thursday to extend their six-day ceasefire in Gaza by one more day to allow negotiators to keep working on deals to swap hostages held in the enclave for Palestinian prisoners.
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