Israel kills suspect in the deadly Tel Aviv shootings

Israeli police said Friday that the man alleged to have killed three people on Jan. 1 after opening fire at a bar in Tel Aviv has been killed in a shootout with police.

Police spokeswoman Luba Samri said the alleged gunman, Nesha'at Milhem, a Palestinian citizen of Israel, "was found in a building" in his hometown of Arara in northern Israel on Friday. She says he came out shooting at Israeli forces and "was then shot and killed."

The suspect, who had been identified in earlier reports as Nesha'at Milhem, is accused of opening fire at a bar on a busy street in Tel Aviv on Jan. 1, killing two people and wounding several others.

He allegedly later shot and killed a taxi driver, who was also a Palestinian citizen of Israel. Relatives had identified Milhem as the suspect after watching footage of the Tel Aviv incident on TV, but the motive behind the killings remains unclear.

Milhem had previously spent four years in prison for assaulting an Israeli soldier, said his lawyer, who also described him as mentally unstable.

Milhelm's relatives had said he was "traumatized" after a cousin was shot dead in a 2006 police arrest raid. At the time, police said they were searching for weapons and claimed the shooting was in self-defense.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu commended the state's forces for "acting relentlessly, methodically, and professionally to locate and neutralize the terrorist," Israeli newspaper Haaretz reported.

Israeli media said Melhem had been located in part through information gained in the interrogation of five people arrested on suspicion of being his accomplices.

The incident came amid more than three months of near-daily Palestinian attacks against Israeli civilians and soldiers.

Over the past three months, Palestinians have protested against Israel's ongoing occupation, as well as incursions by right-wing settler groups into the Al-Aqsa mosque — the third holiest site for Muslims — in East Jerusalem.

Israeli soldiers or settlers since Oct. 1 have shot and killed at least 149 Palestinians, including unarmed protesters, bystanders and alleged attackers. Palestinian assailants have since Oct. 1 killed 23 Israelis, including soldiers and civilians. 

Al Jazeera and wire services