Arab-Jewish tension in parts of Jerusalem was at fever pitch Thursday afternoon, three days after the funerals for three slain Israeli teens and a day after the alleged revenge killing of 16-year-old Muhammed Abu Khdeir, with clashes resuming between residents of East Jerusalem and police.
In the Shuafat neighborhood, where Abu Khdeir lived, dozens of Arabs blocked roads with dumpsters and hurled rocks for the second day running. Police responded with riot control munitions.
The autopsy on Abu Khdeir’s body was concluded shortly after 5 p.m. The surgery had been postponed for hours while a Palestinian pathologist from Hebron, who was to take part in the autopsy, was held up by the IDF closure of the city, Haaretz reported. Upon arriving at the Abu Kabir Forensic Institute in Tel Aviv, there were complications with the paperwork that pushed the procedure off further. It remains unclear when the body will be released for burial.
Arab and Jewish rioters also clashed in the Arab neighborhood of Silwan, outside Jerusalem’s Old City, on Thursday afternoon. Arab rioters punctured the tires of several cars parked in the City of David archaeological complex.
Meanwhile, Jewish rioters hurled Molotov cocktails and rocks at houses in the Silwan neighborhood, next to the archaeological complex.
The main streets in the Shuafat and Beit Hanina neighborhoods, where protesters threw rocks and Molotov cocktails for several hours Wednesday, were partially closed to civilian traffic Thursday morning. The city’s light rail was also running on a reduced schedule until further notice. It would take months to repair the damage caused to the train infrastructure during Wednesday’s riots, officials said.
The East Jerusalem riots broke out minutes after Abu Khdeir’s body was found in the Jerusalem Forest.
Police officials have told The Times of Israel they were investigating two possible motives: that Abu Khdeir was killed in a family honor killing, or that it was a nationalistically motivated slaying. According to officials familiar with the investigation, investigators increasingly view the killing as a revenge attack perpetrated by Jewish terrorists.
Police also closed the Temple Mount to Muslim worshipers on Wednesday and Thursday in an effort to prevent the spreading of riots to the city’s holy sites. They were evaluating the security situation on the Temple Mount ahead of the first day of Friday prayers of Ramadan.
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