Israel promises swift response after teenage girl killed in bomb attack

An Israeli teenage girl was killed and her father and brother injured when an explosive device was detonated close to a West Bank natural spring on Friday morning.

Her brother sustained serious shrapnel wounds and her father, a rabbi, was slightly hurt. The father, a trained medic, used his tzitzit, Jewish ritual fringes, to make a tourniquet to try to stop his son’s wounds bleeding.

Hundreds attended the funeral of Rina Shnerb on Friday afternoon in the Israeli city of Lod. Her father was unable to attend but addressed mourners by telephone from his hospital bed.

"We are trying to be strong here in the land of Israel, the people of Israel, Rina believed in that," said Rabbi Eitan Shnerb. "Our response to the murderers is that we are here and we are strong and we will prevail."

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Military spokesperson Brig Gen Ronen Manelis called the bombing "a serious terror attack" and said that the military had still not determined if the perpetrators acted as part of an established militant group or were working alone.

Planted earlier

The army said that an improvised explosive device (IED) had been used in the attack, and the police said it had been planted earlier at the spring and remotely detonated when the family approached.

Prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu said Israel would respond by strengthening settlements.

No Palestinian group claimed responsibility for the bombing but a number of militant factions praised the attack

“We will deepen our roots and strike at our enemies. The security branches are in pursuit after the abhorrent terrorists. We will apprehend them,” he said. “The long arm of Israel reaches all those who seek our lives and will settle accounts with them.” Following the attack Israel set up roadblocks at a number of locations in the West Bank and carried out searches.

No Palestinian group claimed responsibility for the bombing but a number of militant factions praised the attack. In a sermon at a Gaza city mosque, Hamas leader Ismail Haniya warned "the Zionists to stay away from the powder keg of Jerusalem, which is exploding and will burn whoever attacks it."

Palestinian social media sites called on residents to erase photographs from their security cameras to make the pursuit more difficult for the Israeli security forces.

‘Intolerable situation’

Israel’s right-wing Yamina party issued a statement saying that Jewish lives had become cheap and “this intolerable situation must be stopped by restoring targeted killings, by erecting roadblocks, by demolishing terrorists’ homes and by imposing Israeli sovereignty this very day”.

Some 9,000 Gaza residents took part in Friday protests along the border with Israel

Friday’s blast was the latest in a spate of militant attacks and clashes over the past fortnight in Jerusalem and the West Bank.

Israeli military officials have warned in recent weeks of an increase in violence in the West Bank and Gaza Strip in the lead-up to next month's Israeli elections.

Some 9,000 Gaza residents took part in Friday protests along the border with Israel. Medical sources reported more than 100 were wounded.

Israeli troops used live fire and crowd-dispersal means after they said protestors threw petrol bombs and grenades while others tried to breach the border fence.