A Jewish woman was killed in a ramming attack near the town of Havat Gilad in Samaria. The Palestinian driver initially fled the scene but later surrendered to the Palestinian Authority Police.

Hava Roizen, a 42-year-old resident of the religious Jewish town of Emmanuelle, was hit by a taxi registered in the Palestinian Authority as she crossed the street. The driver, a 63-year old man, abandoned the vehicle and fled on foot to the nearby Arab village of Jit where he turned himself in to the Palestinian Authority police, claiming the incident was an accident.

The driver is in the custody of the Palestinian Authority Police and his case will go through the Palestinian Authority justice system.

After the incident several dozen Jewish residents protested at the site of the attack.

Samaria Regional Council head Yossi Dagan told the media that the attack was clearly an act of terrorism.

“From the point of view of the military commanders in the field, and from our point of view as well, this is a terrorist attack for all intents and purposes,” Dagan said. “The junction is lit by street lamps, and there were no skid marks or other signs” that the perpetrator had attempted to stop the car to avoid hitting his victim in any way.”

“From our point of view, this is another terrorist attack, a cold-blooded murder of a Samaria resident on a central road in the State of Israel,” Dagan said.

The chapter head of Samaria United Hatzalah, Yehuda Hess, was one of the first responders at the scene.

“United Hatzalah EMS volunteers performed CPR on a woman who was critically injured in a car ramming incident near Havat Gilad,” Hess said. “Unfortunately, following a lengthy resuscitative effort paramedics at the scene were forced to pronounce her death due to the severity of her injuries.”

Roizen, an immigrant from the former Soviet Union, was a photographer and travelled a great deal for her job.

This is the second act of terrorism Havat Gilad has suffered this year. In January, Rabbi Raziel Shevach, a 32-year-old father of six, was killed in a shooting attack very near the site of last night’s ramming attack. He was a resident of Havat Gilad. His murder was praised by Hamas, leading to a rebuke of the terrorist organization by U.S. Ambassador David Friedman.

Jews have struggled to continue living in Havat Gilad since the town was first established in 2002. The land for the community was originally purchased from Arabs by Moshe Zar, a political leader in Samaria. The Arabs then contested the sales in court, putting the status of the town on hold. A few months later, before the court case was settled, IDF bulldozers razed the structures. In 2011, the Israeli government destroyed more structures. Throughout its history, there have been low-level hostilities between the Jewish residents and the Arabs of the surrounding villages, culminating in the murder of two Jews this year.