Itongadol.- Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu condemned the Friday terrorist attacks in Otniel in the West Bank and in Paris, saying that fundamentalist Islam was the force driving them both.
"In Israel, like in France, terror is terror, and what stands behind it is extremist Islam and its desire to destroy its victims," Netanyahu said at Sunday\’s cabinet meeting.
"It\’s time that the world wake up and unite to beat terror. It\’s time that countries [around the world] condemn the terror against us in the same way they condemn terror elsewhere in the world," the prime minister said. "It\’s only proper that Abu Mazen [Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas], who yesterday condemned the terror attack in France, condemns the cruel terror against innocents in Israel and battles the incitement that drives it."
On Friday afternoon, Rabbi Ya’akov Litman, 40, and his son Netanel, 18, were gunned down outside Otniel south of Hebron while they were on their way to a pre-wedding Shabbat celebration for one of Litman’s daughters. Five other family members – Litman’s wife, three daughters aged 5, 9, and 11, and a 16-year-old son – suffered minor wounds.
Hours later, assailants killed 129 people across Paris in a spate of attacks. The night\’s carnage began near the Stade de France stadium where France was playing Germany in a friendly soccer match.
Over the next 20 minutes there were three machine gun attacks by groups driving black cars in the 10th and 11th districts in the heart of the French capital. Two were at bars and restaurants, at which bullets of differing calibers were used. The third, the most deadly of all, took place inside the Bataclan concert hall.
"We should remember – we are not responsible for the terror that is turned against us, just like the French aren\’t responsible for the terror turned against them. Terrorists are responsible for terror. Not the [Palestinian] territories, not the settlements, no other factor – but the desire to exterminate us perpetuates the conflict and drives the murderous aggression against us," Netanyahu said.