Police continue search for criminal shooting suspect in Jerusalem

Victim in moderate condition after shot in back, terrorism ruled out.

By DANIEL K. EISENBUD
Updated: MARCH 28, 2016 22:28
Police at a security barricade in the Old City of Jerusalem (photo credit: MARC ISRAEL SELLEM)
Police at a security barricade in the Old City of Jerusalem
(photo credit: MARC ISRAEL SELLEM)
Police continued a manhunt Monday for the suspect in a Sunday night shooting in Jerusalem’s Beit Hakerem neighborhood that left an Israeli man in his 30s hospitalized in moderate condition.
“After shots were fired, police dispatched units at 10:15 p.m. to the scene, where a man in his 30s was found on the ground with two bullet casings nearby,” said police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld.
He called the shooting a criminal matter and not terrorism.
“Magen David Adom paramedics treated him immediately and transferred him to Shaare Zedek medical Center in moderate condition, and police cordoned off the area to search for a suspect.”
Shaare Zedek spokeswoman Shoham Ruvio said the unidentified victim was shot once in the back.
“He is in serious but stable condition, with non-life-threatening injuries,” said Ruvio on Monday. “Doctors are still determining if he will undergo surgery, but he is conscious.”
Rosenfeld said that after a suspect was not arrested within hours of launching a manhunt, which included multiple roadblocks, the case was turned over to the intelligence department.
“We are still trying to determine who is behind the incident,” he said.
This is the second non-terrorist-related shooting of an Israeli man in the capital in less than one week.
An early morning dispute between two Jewish men in the downtown area last Wednesday escalated into a shooting that seriously wounded one man, and lightly wounded a 15-year-old female bystander.
The suspect in that case was immediately arrested at the scene of the shooting, police said.
Rosenfeld said the capital remains at a high level of security since the ongoing terrorism wave began in October.