A gunman shot three Israeli soldiers dead after driving a truck towards the Allenby Bridge crossing before being killed by Israeli Defence Forces.
ADVERTISEMENTThree Israeli soldiers were shot and killed by a Jordanian gunman on Sunday at the border crossing between the West Bank and Jordan, according to Israeli officials.
Israel soldiers then shot the gunman dead.
The attack, which occurred at the Allenby Bridge Crossing between the occupied West Bank and Jordan, appeared to be linked to the war between Hamas and Israel in Gaza.
The victims were men in their 50s, according to Israel’s Magen David Adom rescue service.
Posting on X, the IDF said that further soldiers were sent to the scene to detonate potential bomb threats.
The crossing has seen relatively few security related incidents since 2014, when Israeli security guards shot and killed a Jordanian judge they claimed had attacked them.
The military said the gunman approached the Allenby Bridge Crossing from the Jordanian side in a truck and opened fire at Israeli security forces, who killed the assailant in a shootout.
Jordan is investigating the shooting, its state-run Petra News Agency reported. The Western-allied Arab country made peace with Israel in 1994, but is deeply critical of its policies toward the Palestinians largely owing to its large Palestinian population who have carried out mass protests in respond to the war.
The Allenby crossing over the Jordan River, also known as the King Hussein Bridge, is mainly used by Palestinians and international tourists, as well as for cargo shipments.
Authorities in Israel and Jordan said the crossing was closed until further notice, and Israel later announced the closure of both of its land crossings with Jordan, near Beit Shean in the north and Eilat in the south.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu condemned the attack and linked it to Israel's larger conflict with Iran and allied militant groups, including Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon.
The Israeli-occupied West Bank has seen a surge in violence since the war between, with Israel launching near-daily military arrest raids into dense Palestinian residential areas, triggering a rise of Palestinian attacks on Israelis.
The US, Qatar and Egypt have spent months trying to broker a cease-fire and the return of the hostages, but the negotiations have repeatedly broken down over several sticking points.