By Anees Barghouthy
JERUSALEM
A Palestinian youth suspected of stabbing nine Israelis on a Tel Aviv bus earlier Wednesday has been identified as Hamza Mohamed Hassan Matrouk, a 23-year-old man from the Tulkarm refugee camp, a Palestinian security source has said.
"Matrouk, who left the refugee camp early this morning [to carry out the attack], does not belong to any political faction," the source, requesting anonymity, told The Anadolu Agency.
Earlier in the day, the suspect boarded a Tel Aviv bus and attacked passengers with a knife, leaving five with moderate to serious injuries while four others were lightly wounded, Israeli police said.
He was shot in the leg near the scene of the attack before being arrested, according to police.
Israeli Internal Security Minister Yitzhak Aharonovich said that the Palestinian "terrorist" who attacked the bus in Tel-Aviv had "entered Israel illegally."
Israeli police, meanwhile, said Matrouk would be held for three days before being referred to an Israeli military court.
While no Palestinian group has claimed responsibility for Wednesday's bus attack, leading Hamas member Ezzat al-Rashq described it as "heroic and daring."
Netanyahu blames PA's Abbas for Tel Aviv attack
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has held Palestinian Authority (PA) President Mahmoud Abbas responsible for Wednesday's knife attack in Tel Aviv that left nine Israelis wounded.
"This attack came as a result of the ongoing incitement by the PA against the Jews and the state of Israel," Netanyahu said in a statement.
"Who praised the attack is Hamas, which is Abbas' partner in the [Palestinian] unity government," he added. "It is the same terror attack in Paris, Brussels and in other place in the world."
Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, for his part, blamed Abbas, Hamas and Israeli-Arab lawmakers for the attack. He also linked it to violent protests by Bedouin tribesmen in the southern town of Rahat and a recent string of attacks against Israelis in occupied East Jerusalem.
"Those behind the Tel Aviv attack stand behind the Rahat riots and Jerusalem attacks: Abu Mazen [Abbas], [Hamas leader Ismail] Haniyeh, [leader of the Islamist movement in Israel] Raed Saleh, [and Israeli-Arab lawmakers] Haneen Zoabi, Ahmed Tibi and their partners," Lieberman was quoted as saying by Israeli daily Haaretz.
"It's all part of the same process of undermining Israel's right to exist as a Jewish state," he added.
Israeli Economy Minister Naftali Bennett joined the chorus of recriminations, accusing Abbas of being a "master of terrorism."
"The man responsible for the terror attack in Tel Aviv is the same person marching among the world leaders in Paris," Naftali, leader of the right-wing Bayit Yehudi party, said.
"Abu Mazen pays money for the murders; this makes him the master of terrorism," he said
