JERUSALEM - Israeli police shot and killed a Palestinian driver who fled after his car struck two other officers in disputed east Jerusalem, police said.
The man continued driving after hitting the officers, then abandoned his car and tried to flee on foot, Jerusalem police spokesman Shmuel Ben-Ruby said. The officers were lightly injured.
When he ignored an order by other police officers to stop, they shot him, Ben-Ruby said. He later died of his wounds. Al-Maqqased hospital officials identified him as 41-year-old Zeyad Joulani.
The car was carrying a passenger who apparently had been injured in a stone-throwing incident in the area beforehand, Ben-Ruby said.
Police were investigating the incident and Joulani's background before determining whether to treat the case as a politically motivated attack against police or a hit-and-run accident, national police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said.
Tensions in east Jerusalem are high and sometimes turn violent over conflicting Israeli and Palestinian claims to that sector of the holy city.
Israel annexed east Jerusalem after capturing it from Jordan in 1967, but its sovereignty there is not recognized internationally. Palestinians hope to make the eastern sector the capital of their future state.