- As Reps summon DSS over Ekiti Assembly invasion
An American tourist has been killed and several people wounded in a spate of attacks targeting Israelis near Tel Aviv and in Jerusalem, police say.
The American, named as Taylor Force, was one of 10 people stabbed by an attacker in Jaffa, south of Tel Aviv.
US Vice-President Joe Biden was at an event close by at the time.
Earlier, two Israeli police officers were shot and wounded in occupied East Jerusalem. An ultra-Orthodox Jew was stabbed in Petah Tikva, near Tel Aviv.
Israeli police said the attackers in all three incidents were Palestinian, and had been killed.
Israeli police said the attacker in Jaffa stabbed a number of people in the port area, before moving through the city attacking others.
The Magen David Adom ambulance service said five of the wounded were in a serious condition.
The American stabbed to death has been identified as a student at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee.
Taylor Force was on a trip to Israel to learn more about global entrepreneurship and start-ups, university chancellor Nicholas Zeppos told his fellow students in a letter.
Others on the trip were safe and unharmed, Mr Zeppos said, calling the incident a “horrific act of violence”.
Mr Biden, who had been attending an event with former Israeli President Shimon Peres in the nearby Peres Centre for Peace at the time, “condemned in the strongest possible terms the brutal attack” and “expressed his sorrow at the tragic loss of American life”, the White House said in a statement.
Israeli police said the attacker was a 21-year-old from the West Bank town of Qalqilya who was shot dead at the scene.
In the Jerusalem attack, police said a gunman opened fire on a group of police officers outside the Old City’s Damascus Gate, seriously wounding one of them. The suspect wounded another in the subsequent chase, but was then shot and killed, police said.
Meanwhile, witnesses in the Tel Aviv suburb of Petah Tikva said a Palestinian attacker was killed with his own knife by the ultra-Orthodox Jew who he had just stabbed. The wounded man was rushed to hospital to be treated for wounds to his upper body.
At least 29 Israelis have been killed in a wave of stabbing, shooting or car-ramming attacks by Palestinians or Israeli Arabs since October.
More than 180 Palestinians – mostly attackers, Israel says – have also been killed in that period.
The assailants who have been killed have been shot dead either by their victims or by security forces as they carried out attacks. Some attackers have been arrested.
Other Palestinians have been killed in clashes with Israeli troops.
In the meantime, House of Representatives has summoned Director- General, Department of State Service, DSS, to appear before it within 48 hours to explain why the DSS invaded Ekiti State House of Assembly last Friday. Four lawmakers and top government functionaries were arrested during the invasion.
The summons followed the unanimous adoption of a motion under matters of urgent public importance moved by House Minority Leader, Leo Ogor (PDP-Delta), yesterday. It would be recalled that members and staff of the assembly scampered for safety when armed operatives of the DSS invaded the assembly complex. Presenting the motion, Ogor decried the action, stressing that such interference violated the principle of separation of powers. He said, “It is a clear violation of the provisions of the constitution; it is unacceptable as it demonstrates interference with an arm of government.
“If somebody violates the law and nothing is done, it gives him the privilege to move forward. “Therefore, it is important that we summon the Director-General of DSS to explain where the agency derives its powers to invade and destabilise activities of the House.
The Speaker, Yakubu Dogara, referred the matter to Committee on Public Safety and Intelligence for further legislative action. In a similar vein, Ekiti State Executive Council, EXCO, also yesterday condemned the invasion. The EXCO accused President Muhammadu Buhari of plotting to usurp the state government, using military tactics in view of the governor’s criticism of the president.
It called on the international community, civil society organisations and all lovers of democracy to prevail on the president to ensure immediate release of the detained persons. In a resolution signed by Deputy Governor, Dr Kolapo Olusola and 19 members at its meeting, the EXCO said that four lawmakers were forcibly “abducted in the hallowed chambers on Friday and whisked away to yet-tobe identified destination. “ Commissioner for Finance, Chief Toyin Ojo, was arrested and detained by men of DSS on Monday, March 7.
All of them had been held incommunicado since then and reasons for their abduction and detention remain hazy and farfetched.” Also, the Nigerian Bar Association, NBA, Ado-Ekiti branch, has expressed dismay at “the brazen use of force by men of DSS” in the recent arrest of lawmakers, describing their arrest and detention as “a sharp departure from the tenet of democracy and a clear contravention of the law setting up the institution”.
Ekiti State branch chairman of the NBA, Dr Foluke Dada, in a statement issued in Ado Ekiti yesterday said, “The arrest is a clear contravention of the Constitution of Nigeria, which the DSS is established to uphold at all times when discharging their duties.” This is as the All Progressives Congress, APC, in Ekiti State has alleged plot by the governor to unleash mass violence on the operatives of the Directorate of State Security, DSS, and APC members in the state. The petition by APC State Secretary, Paul Omotoso, to the Police Commissioner, Mr James Etop, and state Director of DSS, Mr Andrew Iorkay, alleged that the governor had been mobilising to attack APC members after a planned invasion of DSS office in Ado-Ekiti.
BBC with additional report from National Mirror
