AL JIB, West Bank — After the raid by Israeli security forces, details of the young Palestinian man’s life had been strewn haphazardly on the floor of one room of his family’s home: a mattress, a tangle of blankets and clothes, an ashtray of cigarette butts, an energy drink can and handwritten notes about electrical circuits — the young man had just received a diploma in electrical studies — and, chillingly in hindsight, a new-looking knife with a long, smooth blade.
The ordinary life that had been lived in the home at the edge of this village in the Israeli-occupied West Bank had suddenly taken on international notoriety: The man, Hamza Matrouk, 23, had stabbed about a dozen people in a rampage that began on a bus in Tel Aviv. Many residents of this farming village between Jerusalem and Ramallah said that they barely knew the young man, Mr. Matrouk; that he was quiet and introspective and had no close friends here.
But by Thursday, a day after the attack, under arrest and being treated in a Tel Aviv hospital, everybody knew his name and what he had done. Mr. Matrouk was shot in the leg by an Israeli corrections officer as he fled the bus and ran through nearby streets, stabbing a woman in the back along the way.
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“All the Palestinian people are following what’s happening in Al Aqsa and Gaza,” she said, “and he is one of the Palestinian people.” She said her son had written on Facebook recently that he was not ready to marry and wanted to work and earn money. Before he left the store Tuesday, she said, he seemed “happy, normal.”
“From a young age, we have always said we should do good things in order to go to paradise,” she continued. “In his opinion, this was a good thing.”
Said Ghazali contributed reporting.
