As grieving Israeli families sat in Shiva Sunday for seven civilians killed in East Jerusalem over the weekend, the family of their Palestinian killer felt a different emotion.
Proud.
“He’s a legend and a hero,” said the killer’s father, Moussa al-Qam, 48, whose own father was stabbed to death in 1998 in what was later recognized by Israeli officials as an act of Jewish terrorism. His son Khairy, 21, who was named after his grandfather, was killed after leading an attack outside a synagogue on Friday.
“I raised him well,” said Mr. al-Qam.
Both Mr al-Qam’s comment and his family history made clear why the present moment feels so hopeless and dangerous in Israel and the occupied territories, following an outbreak of violence that has claimed the lives of seven Israelis and at least 14 Palestinians since Thursday has.
Some Palestinians, like Mr al-Qam, show little empathy for Israeli civilians and live in an environment where Palestinian attacks on Israeli civilians are celebrated and their perpetrators are celebrated – increasing the likelihood of more attacks in the coming days.
Such thirst for revenge, coupled with the Goals of extremist Israeli ministers in Israel’s new government, has raised questions about whether the region is on the cusp of a further escalation involving either a violent grass-roots insurgency in the occupied West Bank, another devastating conflict in Gaza, or both.
The Palestinian Authority, the semi-autonomous body that governs parts of the West Bank, last week scaled back its coordination with Israeli military officials, weakening one of the means by which violent surges have been contained in the past.
The nature of Israel’s response could help decide whether the current surge will peter out or escalate, as could messages from US Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken, who is due to visit Jerusalem and the West Bank on Monday and Tuesday.
But a Palestinian appetite for a renewed wave of violence may ultimately be the deciding factor in where the current moment leads. And in Sunday’s interviews with Palestinians in the West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza, anger at her treatment was widespread, especially after the deadliest year for West Bank Palestinians in more than a decade and a half.
In Jerusalem, the families of seven Israelis killed On Friday, they mourned in cramped, spartan homes and welcomed a steady stream of mourners. Some expressed confusion at how their loved ones had become victims of this cycle of violence. Others expressed anger.
But for the Palestinians, such attacks do not happen in a vacuum: they are fueled by Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians, including the Palestinians Israeli occupation of the West Bank and the creation of a two tier legal system that differentiates between Israelis and Palestinians on the territory; the Israeli-Egyptian Blockade of the Gaza Strip; and isolated acts of violence such as the killing of Mr al-Qam’s father.
“When Palestinians are being killed every day, they see every attack that kills Israelis as something that redeems their dignity,” said Majd Dandis, 31, a neighbor and friend of the al-Qam family.
“Of course people were happy,” Mr Dandis said of the attack by Khairy al-Qam in front of the synagogue. “All Palestinian society was happy, not just this neighborhood.”
Video posted online on Friday showed Palestinians in parts of the West Bank and Gaza Strip cheering news of the attack, handing out candy and setting off fireworks in celebration.
But Palestinian society is not monolithic, like Israel’s national security minister, Itamar Ben-Gvirwho once displayed a portrait of an Israeli mass murderer in his home does not reflect the breadth of Israeli opinion.
There is also empathy among Palestinians for Israeli civilians, as well as a broader, pragmatic awareness of the toll an insurgency could take not only on Israelis but also on the Palestinians themselves.
The families of the Palestinian attackers, including the al-Qams, were evicted from their homes before the buildings were demolished, a common Israeli practice critics call collective punishment. Dozens of her relatives and neighbors were also arrested and interrogated.
The cost to society as a whole would also be high. The second Palestinian intifada, or uprising, in the 2000s left about 1,000 Israelis dead, mostly in terrorist attacks, but about three times that number of Palestinians died in the Israeli response.
In the neighborhood of al-Qams in East Jerusalem, which was conquered by Israel from Jordan in 1967 and which most of the world still considers occupied, fears of an Israeli raid dampened the pride of some residents.
While several of Mr al-Qam’s neighbors agreed that his son was a hero, they also tried to block journalists from speaking to the father to prevent him from saying anything that could cause further trouble in the neighborhood .
A mile away is the family of another Palestinian attacker – a 13-year-old who two Israelis shot and wounded on Saturday morning – showed a similar ambivalence.
They expressed pride in the actions of their 13-year-old relative, who was shot, wounded and arrested after the attack near a Jewish neighborhood in East Jerusalem, and their indifference to the fate of the wounded Israelis. But they said they feared the consequences the attack would have on the boy’s family. His parents and two older brothers have already been interrogated by the Israeli police and their house has been sealed for demolition.
“Of course we are proud of what he has done,” said Khalil Abbasi, 31, the boy’s uncle. “But at the same time, we’re upset because his family didn’t deserve it.”
The relatives said they had never heard of the boy expressing a desire to attack Israelis and that he may have gotten the idea from social media. A 13-year-old classmate of the boy, who was spending the afternoon with family, said he and other young friends tried to dissuade him.
“We said, ‘You don’t have to do it; it will destroy your family,'” said the classmate. “But he went ahead and did it.”
In the pockets of the West Bank and Gaza, some voiced similar caution. In Balata, a stronghold of armed Palestinian groups in the northern West Bank, a member of an armed faction said there was little appetite for a widespread insurgency.
“Everyone is tired,” said Abu Zoofe, 37, a member of the Balata Brigade, a small armed group. “No one wants there to be another intifada,” he said in a phone interview.
In Gaza, some residents said they were not ready for Hamas, the Islamist group that runs the Gaza Strip, to launch rockets into Israeli airspace because it would almost certainly provoke another barrage of Israeli airstrikes that have hit the enclave for less than two years later would devastate last great air war.
Gaza residents “do not want an escalation because the 2021 war has destroyed their mental health and their homes,” said Ahmed Esleem, 19, an undergraduate business student. “So many people are going to die,” he said.
The Hamas leadership on Saturday warned of “an unprecedented escalation,” but did not say it would lead that escalation and did not claim responsibility for the recent attacks in Israel.
Some Palestinians feel they have little to lose from an uprising because the situation is already so tense.
In Jerusalem neighborhoods like Silwan, where the 13-year-old gunman grew up, many Palestinian residents have gone into hiding constant threat of eviction or house demolition. About 200 homes are at risk because of court cases by Israeli settler groups trying to consolidate Israeli control of the city peace now, an anti-occupation advocacy group. The group estimates that another 20,000 Palestinian homes face demolition because their owners built them without planning permission.
A study by the United Nations Office for Humanitarian Affairs described obtaining such a permit as “virtually impossible” for the Palestinians, in part because city authorities in the Palestinian Territories have set aside little land for housing development while facilitating large-scale Israeli settlement construction.
A few yards from the home of the 13-year-old arrested in Saturday’s attack stand the ruins of another building. It was once his aunt’s house. Authorities destroyed it several years ago for lack of permits, the family said.
The al-Qam family home, a few kilometers away, will probably be one of the closest to go. On Sunday it was sealed by Israeli security officials, forcing Mr al-Qam to sleep with relatives and is expected to be demolished in the coming weeks.
Mr al-Qam claimed it was a price worth paying.
“Even if I have to sleep outside, I don’t care,” he said. “As long as my son has done his duty, I don’t care.”
Hiba Yazbek and Raja Abdulrahim contributed reporting.
