Israel hunts gunman after gay men shot

HUNDREDS of police officers scoured the streets of Tel Aviv yesterday in a manhunt for a gunman who shot and killed two people at a youth club in the worst ever attack on homosexuals in Israel.

The Tel Aviv shooting shocked the Mediterranean city, which prides itself on its live-and-let-live attitude and boasts a thriving gay community. The brazen attack drew condemnations from the city’s mayor, from cabinet ministers, the country’s chief rabbis and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

“We’ll bring him to justice and exercise the full extent of the law against him,” Netanyahu said of the killer, speaking at the Israeli Cabinet’s weekly meeting.

A masked man entered a centre for gay teens in downtown Tel Aviv late on Saturday, pulled out a pistol and shot in all directions, police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said.

The shooter then holstered his pistol and fled the scene on foot into the busy streets of Tel Aviv, Rosenfeld said.

The dead were identified as a 26-year-old man who was a counsellor at the youth centre, and a 17-year-old girl. Eleven people were wounded, four in serious condition.

“I took cover with someone under a table, and he kept firing,” 16-year-old Or Gil, who was shot twice in the legs, said.

“When I got up it was horrifying, I just saw blood,” he said.

Photographs of the scene showed bodies lying near a billiard table and a smear of blood on the white-tile floor.

Nitzan Horowitz, Israel’s only openly gay lawmaker, called the attack a “hate crime.”

“This is the worst attack ever against the gay community in Israel,” he said.

“This act was a blind attack against innocent youths, and I expect the authorities to exercise all means in apprehending the shooter.”

Police slapped a gag order on the case.

Mike Hamel, a gay rights activist whose organisation runs the youth club, said the centre served as a safe place where gay teens – many of whom still conceal their sexual identity – could meet with counsellors and other teenagers. He blamed religious incitement against homosexuals.

“Beyond the pain, the frustration and the anger, we are facing a situation in which the incitement to hate creates an environment that allows this to happen,” Hamel said.

Israel’s gays and lesbians typically enjoy freedoms similar to those of gays in European countries.

Gay soldiers serve openly in the military, and openly gay musicians and actors are among the country’s most popular.

However, ultra-Orthodox Jewish leaders often incite against gays, especially in conservative Jerusalem, where there have been clashes between religious and gay activists.

Thousands took to the street in an impromptu march after Saturday’s attack to mourn for the victims and call for tolerance.