Israel Mobilizes Military After Tourist Killed in Car Ramming

• At least five people have been wounded in a suspected terror attack in Tel Aviv, Israel, and one person has been killed.
• The attack comes after a tense and bloody week in the region, which saw a deadly shooting near the Hamra Junction and two raids of the al-Aqsa mosque, which sparked retaliatory rocket fire from Gaza and Lebanon.

Israel's military has been mobilized in response to a suspected terror attack that wounded at least five tourists, and killed another, in Tel Aviv, Israel on Friday.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has instructed the Israel Defense Force to mobilize more units to confront the car-ramming attack and another deadly shooting that took place earlier in the day. He has also ordered Israeli police to call up reservist Border Police units.

On Friday, the Magen David Adom ambulance service said one person died and at least five people have been injured in a car-ramming attack that took place on Kaufmann Street, the Times of Israel reported. The slain victim has been identified as an Italian citizen. The injured victims, who are also tourists, have been taken to Tel Aviv's Ichilov Hospital and Holon's Wolfson Hospital.

Police say the suspected terrorist was shot and killed by officers who saw the attacker try to reach for a weapon in his car after driving into the tourists.

"The police officer approached the car together with the Tel Aviv municipality inspectors and noticed that the driver was trying to reach for a weapon he had in his possession. The police officer and the inspectors neutralized the terrorist," the Israel Police tweeted.

The incident comes after a tense and bloody week for Israel and Palestine and just hours after another shooting near the Hamra Junction, in which two British-Israeli sisters were shot and killed and their mother critically injured in the north of the Jordan Valley. They were in a car that crashed after it was shot at. Officials are still looking for the suspected terrorists, who fled from the scene.

Tensions in the region escalated after Israeli police stormed the al-Aqsa mosque—a site important in both Islam and Judaism and located in Jerusalem—twice this week, raiding the compound and arresting hundreds of Palestinians as they offered prayers for the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. This year, Ramadan coincides with the Jewish Passover holiday.

The raids have not only drawn condemnations from the Arab and Muslim worlds but also sparked retaliatory rocket fire from militants in Gaza. The exchange of fire across the border between Lebanon and Israel is the biggest since the war between Israel and Lebanese Hezbollah guerrillas in 2006.

Earlier in the day, before the car-ramming attack and shooting, Israeli warplanes carried out air strikes in southern Lebanon and the Gaza Strip as part of the growing tensions in the area.

Newsweek reached out to the Magen David Adom service and the Israeli government for comment via email.