A Palestinian was shot and seriously injured on Sunday morning after he stabbed an Israeli border guard policeman near Damascus Gate at the Old City of occupied East Jerusalem, witnesses and Israeli police said.

Although the Palestinian was earlier reported dead, an Israeli police spokesperson Mickey Rosenfeld later said he had been moved to Hadassah Medical Center in Jerusalem and his state was not known,

Witnesses told Ma’an that the Palestinian had been shot six times at close range and been left bleeding.

A Hadassah Medical Center spokesperson could not be reached for comment.

Rosenfeld said that the Israeli border guard policeman was in critical condition and had been taken to hospital.

Israeli news site Ynet quoted an Israeli emergency paramedic, Aharon Adler, as saying: “When we arrived at the scene we found a young man around 20 years old lying unconscious with several stab wounds in his upper body.

“We gave him life-saving medical treatment including anesthetizing and ventilating him, and evacuated him while treating him to the Shaare Zedek Medical Center in a very critical condition.”

Rosenfeld added that the area had been cordoned off for an hour and a half following the incident.

The attack is the latest in a string of attacks by Palestinians on Israeli forces and civilians and comes two days after an Israeli was shot dead while driving in the occupied West Bank near Ramallah.

(Ma’an – www.maannews.net)