The incident ended after two and a half hours when two of the hostages overpowered their captor. Three people were injured, including the attacker's wife and son.
The hostage-taker, a former factory employee himself, took over the cafeteria at 3:00am and held seven employees hostage. He then called his estranged wife, who arrived on the scene with her 16-year-old son. When they refused to comply with his commands to join the other hostages, the assailant opened fire on them, injuring them moderately-to-lightly.
At the sound of gunfire, security and first-response teams began to flow to the scene.
A couple of hours later, the armed man released five hostages. The remaining two then took advantage of a moment when their captor was distracted, jumped him, and wrestled the rifle from his hands. During the struggle, one of the hostages was lightly injured and the attacker ran out of bullets. The uninjured hostage managed then to incapacitate the attacker and drag him to policemen who were stationed at the factory gate.
Police commander for the Galilee region, Brig-Gen Dov Lutzky called the incident extremely serious. The fact that it concluded without anyone getting killed, Brig-Gen Lutzky added, "is unusually excellent."
The hostage-taker, a former factory employee himself, took over the cafeteria at 3:00am and held seven employees hostage. He then called his estranged wife, who arrived on the scene with her 16-year-old son. When they refused to comply with his commands to join the other hostages, the assailant opened fire on them, injuring them moderately-to-lightly.
At the sound of gunfire, security and first-response teams began to flow to the scene.
A couple of hours later, the armed man released five hostages. The remaining two then took advantage of a moment when their captor was distracted, jumped him, and wrestled the rifle from his hands. During the struggle, one of the hostages was lightly injured and the attacker ran out of bullets. The uninjured hostage managed then to incapacitate the attacker and drag him to policemen who were stationed at the factory gate.
Police commander for the Galilee region, Brig-Gen Dov Lutzky called the incident extremely serious. The fact that it concluded without anyone getting killed, Brig-Gen Lutzky added, "is unusually excellent."