JERUSALEM (AP) – Hundreds of Palestinians hurled stones at Israeli police who responded with tear gas in clashes that erupted Wednesday following reports that an Arab teen was kidnapped and a body found in a Jerusalem forest.
Police have not determined whether the reported incidents are related or what motive may have been behind them. But Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu urged authorities to swiftly investigate the “reprehensible murder” and called on all sides “not to take the law into their own hands.”
Tensions have mounted between Israel and the Palestinians after the bodies of three Israeli teens were found in the West Bank more than two weeks after they went missing.
Israel has accused Hamas of abducting and killing the three teens, and has arrested hundreds of its members across the West Bank. Rocket fire from the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip has meanwhile intensified, and been met with Israeli air strikes.
Israeli police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said police received a report early Wednesday that an Arab teen was “forcibly pulled into a vehicle” in an area of east Jerusalem and that an hour later a body was discovered in a separate part of the city.