Security source: Jerusalem attacks seem like 'a planned and timed assault'

Prime minister convenes emergency security cabinet meeting following spate of terrorist attacks.

By BEN HARTMAN, HERB KEINON, NOAM AMIR/MAARIV HASHAVUA
Updated: OCTOBER 13, 2015 15:18
How can Israel put an end to this wave of terror?
A security source said that the two terrorist attacks that killed three people and wounded several others in Jerusalem on Tuesday morning seem to be "a planned and timed assault."
"There is no doubt that the source of incitement of the sequence of terrorist attacks this morning is east Jerusalem," the source added.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has convened an emergency meeting of the security meeting, scheduled to take place at 3:00 p.m, in light of the terrorist attacks in Jerusalem and the central city of Ra'anana.
Scenes of double terror attacks in Jerusalem
Two separate terrorist attacks were waged in the capital Tuesday morning, in which three people were killed and several wounded. At the same time, five people were wounded in two terrorist attacks that were carried out in Ra'anana.
Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan is holding consultations to determine a number of immediate steps to deal with the terror wave, including a closure on east Jerusalem neighborhoods - from where many of the attackers originate - and also making it easier for civilians to receive gun permits, according to the Public Security Ministry.
Following Tuesday morning's attacks, Deputy Foreign Minister Tzipi Hotovely said that the  Palestinian Authority has turned into an “incubator for fanatic terrorism” and Israel should consider halting its monthly financial transfers to it.
“The blood of Israeli citizens is on the hands of [PA President] Mahmoud Abbas and his colleagues who are inciting children to commit murder,” she said. Hotovely cited Abbas' spokesman Nabil Abu Rudeineh as “praising and glorifying at 13-year-old Palestinian who set out with a butcher knife to murder Israeli children in a candy shop.”
The deputy foreign minister was referring to Monday's attack in Jerusalem's Pisgat Ze'ev neighborhood.
The Foreign Ministry is is urging donor countries to the PA “to use their influence to effect a cessation in violence and incitement by the Palestinian Authority,” she added.
Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat called on the government to increase sanctions in response to the security situation upon arriving on the scene of the stabbing and shooting attack that took place aboard a bus in the capital's Armon Hanatziv neighborhood.
"We will not let it slide. We can do more and I believe that we need to take more drastic steps," said Barkat. "If we need to close neighborhoods and villages in and around Jerusalem to increase our safety we will do it," he said.
The mayor also beseeched citizens not to take matters into their own hands and to allow security forces to do their work.
JPost.com staff contributed to this report.