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A police officer has been injured in a crossbow attack outside the Israeli embassy in the Serbian capital, Belgrade.<\/p>\n
Interior Minister Ivica Dacic told reporters that the officer had subsequently shot and killed the assailant.<\/p>\n
The attacker – who authorities have said was Serbian – had hit the policeman in the neck with an arrow, Mr Dacic said. <\/p>\n
The officer has had surgery, and is no longer in a serious condition, authorities say. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Serbian broadcaster B92 quoted Mr Dacic as saying the attacker had approached a small building at the front of the Israeli embassy around 11:00 (09:00 GMT), purportedly asking about a museum.<\/p>\n
He then opened the door to the small building, removed a crossbow and shot the officer, Mr Dacic was quoted as saying. The officer then returned fire and the assailant died about half an hour later.<\/p>\n
Serbian authorities told the AFP news agency that the assailant was born in 1999 in the town of Mladenovac, around 30 miles from the capital.<\/p>\n
They said he had later moved to Novi Pazar – the cultural centre of the Bosniak Muslim minority – and converted to Islam.<\/p>\n
Mr Dacic said the case had been taken over by special prosecutors and that several others had been arrested as a precautionary measure.<\/p>\n
While the interior minister suggested the attack may have been part of a larger threat, Serbian Prime Minister Milos Vucevic called it “a crime of an individual”.<\/p>\n
According to comments reproduced by the Beta news agency, he described the incident as “an act of insanity, which cannot be attributed to any religion and any nation”.<\/p>\n
Both the prime minister and interior minister characterised the incident as a “terrorist act”.<\/p>\n
The Israeli foreign ministry said the embassy had been closed at the time of the incident and that no employees had been injured.<\/p>\n
The incident in Belgrade is not the first time someone has seemingly attempted to attack an Israeli embassy since 7 October, when Hamas carried out an unprecedented attack on southern Israel, and Israel launched a campaign to destroy Hamas.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n