The woman, named by Israeli media as Shulamit Ovadia, was attacked on a street near her home in the city of Holon on Tuesday afternoon. Security camera footage of the incident shows a man with a metal bar hitting her repeatedly from behind before she falls to the ground. Ovadia was found unconscious by a passerby and pronounced dead at the scene by rescuers. The search for Palestinian suspect Musa Sarsour, 28, was called off early Wednesday after his body was found in downtown Tel Aviv. Israeli media cited police as saying his death was an apparent suicide. Sarsour, from the occupied West Bank city of Qalqilya, had a work permit to enter Israel legally for a construction job, where wages are much higher. Israeli police spokesman Shlomo Sagi said Sarsour had been stopped and questioned by police in the weeks before the attack, but was let go after showing his work permit. “He has been checked twice by the police in the last two weeks. But he had nothing on him, no knife or anything. The investigation shows that he acted alone, but we need to investigate further to see if he had partners. There is much more work to be done,” he told Israel Military Radio. In a statement late Tuesday, Israel’s caretaker prime minister, Yair Lapid, described the incident as “a shocking attack by a despicable and cowardly terrorist who murdered an elderly woman who was unable to fight back.” The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said five people suspected of helping Ovandia’s murder were arrested overnight in the West Bank. Israeli media reported that the five were members of Sarsour’s family. Israel frequently arrests relatives of Palestinians suspected of terrorist attacks. Ovandia is survived by her husband, whom she cared for, and her three children and grandchildren. A total of 22 people in Israel and illegal West Bank settlements have been killed by Palestinians this year. A particularly deadly wave of attacks this spring led Israel to launch Operation Breakwater, an onslaught of near-night raids designed to root out Palestinian militants from strongholds in the West Bank. Hundreds of Palestinians have since been arrested and about 90 have been killed, a seven-year high. Many of the dead were militants, while others were local youths killed while throwing stones or bombs at Israeli troops. Civilians have also been killed in the violence, including veteran Al Jazeera journalist Shireen Abu Aqleh. The raids have escalated tensions in several restive cities and weakened the Palestinian Authority, which administers parts of the West Bank and maintains security ties with Israel.
