Jewish Extremist, Wife, Shot in 20-Bullet West Bank Drive-By

Drive-by Hebron. Image by Getty Images

By JTA December 9, 2015

A former member of the and his wife were badly injured in a 20-bullet drive-by shooting in the West Bank.

Gunmen in a passing car shot at the couple’s vehicle on Wednesday evening near the Avnei Hefetz settlement, the Times of Israel reported.

Haaretz identified the victims as husband and wife, Shaul and Racheli Nir, both 60.

Shaul Nir, according to Haaretz, was found guilty of perpetrating a 1983 shooting and hand grenade attack on the Islamic College of Hebron, which killed three students and wounded 33.

He was sentenced to life in prison – but served just seven years — for his role in the attack and his attempt to assassinate Palestinian officials, but in 1990 President Chaim Herzog commuted his and his two co-conspirators’ sentence and ordered his release.

Shaul Nir was shot in the head; Racheli Nir was lightly injured. They were taken to separate hospitals for treatment.

The attack left 20 bullet holes in the car.

Hours earlier, two Israelis in their 20s were injured in a stabbing attack in Hebron, also in the West Bank. One, a soldier, suffered multiple wounds to his upper body. Israeli security forces shot and killed the assailant, who was Palestinian, according to Israeli reports.

Haaretz reported that one of the injured Israelis is the son of former Jewish Home Knesset member Orit Strock and that the Hebron assailant, Abad a-Rachman Yusori Maswada, is the cousin of a terrorist who stabbed a man in Hebron Monday.

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