The Israeli military detained one of its soldiers Thursday after video showed the soldier shooting a Palestinian attacker who had just stabbed another soldier.
A video of the incident in the West Bank city of Hebron shows the Palestinian attacker laying on the ground, while the Israeli soldier approaches him and fires one shot. While the video does not show the soldier shooting the assailant, blood can be seen after the shot rings out, the Associated Press reports.
Israeli military spokesman Peter Lerner told Reuters the soldier has been suspended from duty while military police conduct a formal criminal investigation.
“The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) views this incident as a grave breach of IDF values, conduct and standards of military operation,” he said.
Prior to the shooting, two Palestinian assailants had attacked the Israeli soldiers with knives. One was killed in initial gunfire before the incident that apparently led to the other Palestinian's death.
The injured soldier was taken to an Israeli hospital, where a spokeswoman says he is in stable condition and only sustained light injuries in the attack.
Reuters news agency reports the Palestinian Health Ministry identified the two dead men as Ramzi al-Qasrawi and Abdel-Fattah al-Sharif, both 21.
Israeli forces have killed nearly 200 Palestinians since October 2015, and say 129 of them were assailants. During the same time period, Palestinians have killed 28 Israelis and two U.S. citizens while carrying out attacks in the streets.
