At around 7:30 p.m. on Saturday evening (October 3, 2015), a knife-wielding Arab attacked Rabbi Aharon Banita-Bennett, his wife, their 2-year-old son and baby daughter who were on their way to pray at the Western Wall in Jerusalem's Old City. Rabbi Nehemia Lavi, an Old City resident and IDF reserve officer, went down with his gun to try and save those wounded by the Arab terrorist in the attack, but the terrorist stabbed him and seized his weapon.
Border Police forces stationed nearby shot and killed the attacker. Bennett's wife Adele was seriously wounded. Their 2-year-old son was lightly wounded and the infant was unharmed.
Lavi and Bennett, who were stabbed in the upper body and were unconscious when paramedics arrived at the scene, died in hospital shortly afterwards.
Rabbi Nehemia Lavi, a father of seven, has lived in the Old City for the past 23 years and is a rabbi at Yeshivat Ateret Kohanim.
Rabbi Aharon Bennett,
a member of the Breslov Hassidic community in Beitar Illit, was an IDF soldier through Project Shahar, which integrates haredim into the army.
The attacker was identified as
Mohammad Halabi, a 19-year-old Palestinian law student at Al-Quds University from a village near Ramallah. The Islamic Jihad claimed responsibility for the attack. Hamas praised the attack as "heroic".