Israel Sunday took the drastic step of barring Palestinians from Jerusalem's Old City as fears of a further escalation in violence mounted after attacks that killed two Israelis and wounded a child. A series of clashes involving Israeli security forces, Jewish settlers and Palestinians also broke out in East Jerusalem and the West Bank. The Old City restrictions will be in place for two days, with only Israelis, tourists, residents of the area, business owners and students allowed, police said. Worship at the sensitive Al-Aqsa Mosque compound will be limited to men aged 50 and above. There will be no age restrictions on women. The Palestinian government denounced "Israeli escalation" after the announcement of the ban, which Israeli Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan called unprecedented. The usually bustling alleyways of the walled Old City were mostly quiet Sunday morning, with hundreds of police guarding entrances. There were clashes Saturday overnight and Sunday, and the Red Crescent reported 77 Palestinians wounded from both live rounds and rubber bullets. Another 139 had been treated for tear gas inhalation and six for injuries sustained in beatings by soldiers or Jewish settlers, a Red Crescent spokeswoman said. Clashes broke out in areas including Jenin in the West Bank and the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Issawiya, where Alloun was from. On Saturday night, a Palestinian said to be an Islamist militant killed two Israeli men and wounded a woman and a toddler in a knife and gun attack in the Old City. Police shot dead the attacker. In a separate incident early Sunday, a 19-year-old Palestinian allegedly stabbed and wounded a 15-year-old passerby in west Jerusalem before being shot dead by police while fleeing. Adding argument to the Israeli report, Palestinian News Network said Fadi Alloun was shot by police after an Israeli settler accused him of trying to initiate a stabbing operative, implying Alloun did not execute any attack. U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon called for calm, saying he was "deeply concerned that these latest incidents signal a dangerous slide toward escalation." There have been fears that the sporadic violence could spin out of control, with some warning of the risk of a third Palestinian intifada, or uprising. Saturday's Old City attack saw a 2-year-old child slightly wounded in the leg and taken to hospital. A woman was in serious condition, rescue services said. The two men who were killed were a 41-year-old rabbi and resident of the Old City as well as a 21-year-old who lived in a West Bank settlement and was an off-duty soldier, Israeli media said. Media reports said three of the victims were members of the same ultra-Orthodox family on their way to the Western Wall. According to their reports, the attacker first used a knife, but reportedly took a gun from one of the male victims and fired at officers when they responded after being alerted, before he was himself shot dead. Police named him as Mohannad Shafiq Halani, 19, from a village near Ramallah in the West Bank. Militant group Islamic Jihad said he was one of its members, but did not claim responsibility for the attack. Islamist movement Hamas, in power in the Gaza Strip, praised the attack as "a heroic act of resistance." Premier Benjamin Netanyahu said Sunday Israel was "waging a fight to the death against Palestinian terror," and ordered new measures. "These steps include, among others, speeded-up demolition of terrorists' homes."
