Italian stabbed to death in Jerusalem

Assailant attacks tourist walking near Flower Gate, then flees the scene.

By ETGAR LEFKOVITS
A 24-year-old Italian tourist was stabbed to death Thursday near Jerusalem's Old City by an Arab assailant in an apparent terror attack, police said. The tourist was walking with a group of four tourists on Sultan Suleiman Street in the heart of east Jerusalem, near the Flower Gate, when a young Arab attacker approached them from behind and stabbed one of them in the back, Jerusalem police spokesman Shmuel Ben-Ruby said. The assailant then hurled the knife of the ground and fled the scene. The tourist, who was critically wounded in the nighttime attack, died shortly afterwards of his wounds. Police said that the motive for the attack was apparently terror-related. The identity of the victim was not immediately released, pending notification of next of kin. Police arrested three suspects after conducting a manhunt. The rare attack against a tourist in the city came one month after a Jerusalem yeshiva student was stabbed and moderately wounded by an Arab attacker nearby. The 17-year old suspect, who was arrested ten days later, told police investigators that he decided to attack a Jew after watching TV pictures of the fighting in Lebanon and Gaza.