AFP, April 8, 2022 — At least two people were killed Thursday and several wounded in a shooting spree in the Israeli coastal city of Tel Aviv, the latest in a surge of violence in Israel and the occupied West Bank since late March.

The attack sparked mayhem in Dizengoff Street, a popular nightspot full of bars and restaurants.

It was not immediately clear who was responsible for the shooting, which came with Israeli security forces already on high alert.

But the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas, which controls the Gaza Strip, and the Islamic Jihad welcomed the attack.

Witnesses told AFP that they heard gunfire and saw scenes of chaos.

“It’s an atmosphere of war. Soldiers and police are everywhere… They searched the restaurant, and people are crying,” said Binyamin Blum, who works in a restaurant near the scene.

Two people were killed and four others seriously wounded, the Magen David Adom emergency service said.

“Sixteen people evacuated to hospitals, two dead, four seriously wounded,” said spokesperson Zaki Heller.

Tel Aviv’s Ichilov Hospital confirmed that two people were killed and “several seriously injured”.

“Most of them were severely wounded with various kind of injuries mainly in the thoracic area, in the abdomen, and some in the face,” hospital director Ronni Gamzu told AFP.

Police spokesman Baruch Honig said more than 1,000 policemen were deployed in Tel Aviv.

They cordoned off the scene of the attack, asking people to stay indoors “while they track down suspects”, a police statement said.

Unverified social media images showed panicked people fleeing the scene, with glass carpeting the ground.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken condemned the “terrorist attack” and said Washington would “continue to be in regular contact with our Israeli partners, with whom we stand resolutely in the face of senseless terrorism and violence.”

Outside a cafe, a man comforted a woman sitting on a bar stool as heavily armed police deployed nearby.

Witnesses told AFP they had heard gunshots. By Daniella Cheslow with Guillaume Lavallee in Jerusalem