TIME Israeli-Palestinian Conflict

Netanyahu Slams Hamas, Palestinian Leadership After Jerusalem Synagogue Attack

Four rabbis were killed early Tuesday

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu condemned the Palestinian Authority and militant group Hamas for spreading “hatred and incitement” against Jews in a news conference Tuesday, hours after assailants burst into a Jerusalem synagogue and killed four people.

Authorities said two Palestinian men armed with a gun, knives and axes entered a synagogue in West Jerusalem early on Tuesday and committed the most serious attack yet after weeks of clashes around the Temple Mount, also known as the Noble Sanctuary. The four victims were Rabbis; three were dual U.S. citizens and the fourth was British. Eight others were wounded.

Chaos and Mourning in Jerusalem After Synagogue Attack

An Israeli police officer gestures as he holds a weapon near the scene of an attack at a Jerusalem synagogue, Nov. 18, 2014. Israeli emergency personnel take out a body of an Israeli man outside a synagogue on Nov. 18, 2014 in Jerusalem. People react as they stand outside a synagogue on Nov. 18, 2014 in Jerusalem. Israeli police crime scene investigators stand near bodies of suspected attackers outside a synagogue on Nov. 18, 2014 in Jerusalem. Israeli security personnel run next to a synagogue, where a suspected Palestinian attack took place, in Jerusalem, Nov. 18, 2014. A bullet hole in a synagogue's front glass seen from inside and looking outwards to the Har Nof neighborhood in Jerusalem, Nov. 18, 2014. Ultra-Orthodox Jewish youths look at the scene of a shooting attack in a synagogue in Jerusalem, Nov. 18, 2014. Mourners gather for the triple funeral of Rabbi Kalman Levine, Avraham Goldberg and Arieh Kupinsky on Nov.18, 2014 in Jerusalem. Ultra-Orthodox Jews carry the body of Mosheh Twersky during his funeral in Jerusalem, Nov. 18, 2014.

Netanyahu singled out Hamas for blame, accusing the group’s leaders of inflaming tensions by libeling Israel “every hour, constantly, through the schools, in the media, in the mosques.”

He also condemned Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, who had earlier spoken out against Tuesday’s attack, for proceeding to “connect it to all sorts of imaginary events that ostensibly Israel performs at the Temple Mount which does not take place.” The perpetrators’ homes, Netanyahu vowed, would be demolished.

MORE: Fears of Religious Conflict After Synagogue Killings

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