Security Footage Shows Moment Ax-Wielding Palestinian Went After Israeli Shopping Mall Guard

Israel has faced more than five months of nearly daily stabbings and other attacks carried out by Palestinian assailants. Security camera footage released Sunday offered a close-up and graphic glimpse at just how brutal and terrifying the attacks have been.

The Jerusalem Post published video showing the moment in the early hours of Friday when a security guard at a mall in the Israeli community of Maaleh Adumim outside Jerusalem was struck over and over by an ax-wielding Palestinian man, injuring him critically. After the victim is down and unable to stand, the attacker walks away but then returns to mete out more blows.

Israeli police announced Sunday that they had arrested the suspect in the killing -- a 21-year-old from the Palestinian town of Al-Eizariya south of Jerusalem’s Mount of Olives -- following a tip from a family member. The police said that the suspect had admitted to committing the crime.

Israel’s Arutz Sheva reported that the suspect, identified by police as Saadi Ali Abu Hammad, was an employee of the mall where the attack occurred.

The victim of the attack, identified a 48-year-old father of four, is now fighting for his life in the hospital where his family is “praying for a miracle” and asking the public to pray for him as well, Arutz Sheva reported.

He was found in a pool of his blood by a mall cleaner who called an ambulance and police at about 1:00 a.m. on Friday morning, according to Israeli media reports.

“They crushed his head with ax blows,” the victim’s brother told Israel’s Army Radio. “He is still in serious condition, anesthetized and hooked up to a respirator.”

Arutz Sheva reported that this was not the family’s first run-in with Palestinian terrorism. The victim’s brother was seriously injured in 2000 when a Palestinian rammed his car into him and then stabbed him repeatedly.