The scene of the scissor-stabbing attack in Jerusalem last month. Photo: Magen David Adom.

A 16-year-old Palestinian girl who committed a stabbing attack with a pair of scissors last month in Jerusalem was charged with two counts of attempted murder, Israel’s Channel 10 reported on Friday.

According to the indictment, which was submitted to Jerusalem district juvenile court by prosecutor Yifat Gefen, a female relative of the girl’s had approached her on Nov. 22, 2015 with a plan to carry out an attack against Israelis, to avenge the death of her brother, allegedly killed by Israeli security forces in 2013.

The next day, the two girls departed from their home in Kfar Aqab, the northernmost Palestinian neighborhood in east Jerusalem, and traveled by bus to the Al Aqsa Mosque. The Temple Mount, which houses Al Aqsa, has become a flash point for violence between Israelis and Palestinians, the latter of whom believe the Israeli government is trying to change the decades-old status quo at the site with Jordanian authorities — according to which Jews are barred from worshiping there.

After praying, the two girls went and bought the scissors with which they apparently planned to stab Israelis, and boarded the Jerusalem light rail. They then exited the train at the City Hall stop on Jaffa Road, and continued on foot until they reached the site they had selected to commit their attack, near the entrance to the Mahane Yehuda outdoor market.

According to the indictment, the girl’s relative stabbed a man sitting on a city bench in the neck and back. The victim (who turned out to be a Palestinian man in his 70s) fled, while bleeding.

Seeing the girls flailing the scissors over their heads, another man, 64, ran toward the two. The girl in the indictment lunged toward him with the scissors. Suddenly, yet another man slammed her with a chair and she fell to the ground.

Meanwhile, the girls continued swinging the knife at the 64-year-old man, who  managed to remove a firearm and shoot her, causing her to collapse.

A police officer arrived and joined the first man shooting the two girls, killing the indicted teen’s relative at the scene of the attack.

The attack underscores a wider trend of stabbing attacks by Palestinian teenagers and young adults aimed at Israelis. Israeli soldiers and civilians have killed dozens of such attackers in the last two months since the flare-up of violence. 

Earlier this week, Israeli media reported that another minor who committed a stabbing attack had been placed by the Welfare Ministry in a facility for children victims of domestic violence, because he was under the age (12) of legal culpability. Jerusalem authorities have passed around flyers in Arabic encouraging parents to warn their children of the fatal consequences of launching such attacks, and to be wary of suspicious behavior their kids might be exhibiting.