Rami Hamdallah
Rami HamdallahReuters

On Thursday, the United Nations accused Israelis in Judea and Samaria of attacking the convoy of Palestinian Authority premier Rami Hamdallah, condemning the incident and warning that such attacks can be potentially fatal.

Nickolay Mladenov, the UN’s special coordinator in the region, issued a formal condemnation Thursday of an incident which apparently took place on December 25th, but was not publicized at the time.

The Christmas Day stoning occurred as Palestinian Authority premier Rami Hamdallah was returning home following a holiday event in Bethlehem.

During the drive home, stones were reportedly thrown at Hamdallah’s convoy, injuring two of his bodyguards.

Mladenov called the attack “very worrying” and warned that “stones can kill”.

"The stoning attack on Palestinian Prime Minister Hamdallah's convoy on Christmas is a very worrying incident," Mladenov said.

“It is absolutely unacceptable and the perpetrators must be brought to justice. Stones can kill — it was at the same spot that, Aisha al-Rabi lost her life in October,” the UN special coordinator continued, referencing the death of an Arab woman in Samaria. “Such violence must stop immediately.”

Al-Rabi died on Friday, October 12th while driving with her husband when he crashed after the car was hit by rocks.

The Palestinian Authority has accused local Israelis of the attack.

Israeli police, who are investigating the incident, have placed a gag order on the probe.

While the United Nations condemned last month’s stoning incident, the international body has largely ignored the daily stone-throwing attacks by Palestinian Arabs on Israeli Jews.

Despite a major decrease in the number of stone-throwing attacks in 2018, there were still on average between five to six such attacks every day, with 2057 attacks total. In addition, there were between two to three firebomb attacks every day on average last year, or 893 total.