Victims included local residents, an Israeli Arab police officer, and workers from Ukraine
The five people who were killed when a gunman opened fire in the central Israeli city of Bnei Brak on Tuesday were laid to rest in Israel. It was the third terror attack in a little more than a week.
The victims were Amir Khoury, 32, of Nof Hagalil; Yaakov Shalom, 36, of Bnei Brak; Avishai Yehezkel, 29, of Bnei Brak; Victor Sorokopot, 38, of Ukraine; and Dimitri Mitrik, 23, of Ukraine.
Khoury, an Arab Israeli from the northern town of Nof Hagalil, served on the Bnei Brak police station’s motorcyclist responders team. Khoury and his partner were the officers who caught up with the terrorist and killed him. His commanders praised him for no doubt saving many lives in Bnei Brak by engaging in a firefight with the terrorist. He is survived by his parents and three siblings.
Shalom was the son of Rabbi Meir Shalom, a prominent leader of the Yemenite Jewish community in Bnei Brak who passed away last year. He is survived by his mother, wife and five children.
Yehezkel, a teacher, had taken his 2-year-old son for an evening walk in his stroller when he was shot while trying to protect the boy. He is survived by his wife, who is eight months pregnant, and his son.
Sorkopot and Mitrik were foreign workers employed in construction and living in the city. They were shot dead as they sat outside a local grocery store. Sorokopot is survived by his wife.
Bnei Brak is home to one of the largest observant Jewish communities in the world, and boasts hundreds of yeshivahs. The city just saw almost 1 million people gather for the funeral of Rabbi Chaim Kanievsky, a revered figure in the community.
Police said the gunman was a 26-year-old Arab male from the West Bank who worked in Bnei Brak illegally. He was apparently equipped with an M-16 automatic rifle. He had previously served a six-month prison sentence after a conviction on terror ties and illegal sale of weapons. He was shot and killed at the scene.
Graphic video from the Bnei Brak attack shows a man bearing a rifle taking aim at civilians outside a convenience store. A young man is seen fleeing and seeking shelter in an apartment building as the gunman went on his murderous rampage.
The footage shows the terrorist then running through the street shooting at a car, and then approaching the car and possibly firing again into the window.
The incident closely follows Sunday’s terror attack in Hadera, which killed two people and last week’s attack in the southern city of Beersheva, which killed four people, including a Chabad-Lubavitch emissary. In both previous attacks, the perpetrators were said to have been aligned with ISIS.
