‘Resilience’ of Tel Aviv praised after deadly attack

Israeli leaders praised the “resilience” of Tel Aviv, after life returned to normal in the city following last week’s deadly attack at the Sarona market, when two Palestinian gunmen killed four Jewish Israeli diners.

As Tel Aviv residents returned to work and even rallied to support the victims of the Orlando attack, the head of Israel’s military intelligence, Maj. Gen. Herzi Halevi, said the country’s response to Wednesday’s sent a strong message to its enemies.

Autopsies have delayed some of the funerals of Sarona victims, including former Special Forces soldier Ido Ben Ari, mother-of-four Ilana Naveh, university professor Michael Feige and 32-year old Mila Mishayev, who was waiting for her fiancé.

One of the 16 injured, a 27-year old man shot twice in the head during the attack, walked out of hospital this week – with one of the bullets as a souvenir. Assaf Bar, who is expected to make a full recovery, still has the other bullet lodged in his skull.

The attack prompted a security crackdown, with increased raids on homes and workshops in the West Bank, the withdrawal of travel permits for Ramadan, and IDF plans to demolish the homes of the two perpetrators in the town of Yatta, near Hebron. The town is also home to the 16-year old who stabbed a mother-of-six to death in her home in January. His home has also been destroyed.

Right-wing religious nationalists, many living in Jewish settlements in the West Bank, were condemned for joining Hamas in celebrating the Tel Aviv attacks on social media, joyous that the country’s cosmopolitan heart had also been targeted.

Comments were posted welcoming the death of “Arab lovers” and “leftists,” as the secular majority in the city is seen. Zionist Union Knesset Member Merav Michaeli was one of many expressing disbelief at the sentiments. Addressing the commentators directly, she said: “I refuse to believe that you think that Israeli women and men deserve to be murdered in a terror attack, even if they are leftists.”