Obama: ‘No justification’ for Jerusalem attack

President Obama strongly condemned an attack Tuesday on a Jerusalem synagogue that killed four rabbis — including three Americans — and urged Israeli and Palestinian leaders “to work cooperatively together to lower tensions.”

“I strongly condemn today’s terrorist attack on worshipers at a synagogue in Jerusalem, which killed four innocent people, including U.S. citizens Aryeh Kupinsky, Cary William Levine, and Mosheh Twersky, and injured several more,” the president said in a statement.

{mosads}Obama said there could “be no justification for such attacks against innocent civilians” and offered the thoughts and prayers of the American people to the victims and their families.

“At this sensitive moment in Jerusalem, it is all the more important for Israeli and Palestinian leaders and ordinary citizens to work cooperatively together to lower tensions, reject violence, and seek a path forward towards peace,” he added.

Two Palestinian men entered the synagogue armed with guns, knives, and axes, and killed the men during morning prayers.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the attack was the “direct result of incitement” by Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas.

Abbas has spoken forcefully in recent weeks amid speculation that Israel would begin allowing Jews more access to pray at a holy site also important to Muslims.

Netanyahu added that the Israeli government would “respond with a heavy hand to the brutal murder of Jews who came to pray and were met by reprehensible murderers.”

“We’ve got to make sure there are no copycat attacks,” Israeli spokesman Mark Regev told CNN. 

Abbas said the attacks “violate all religious principles and do not serve the common interest we are trying to promote — establishing a Palestinian state alongside the State of Israel,” according to Haaretz.

But the Palestinian leader said he also condemned “aggression” toward the disputed holy site “and torching of mosques and churches.”

Addressing members of the press later Tuesday morning, Obama said Secretary of State John Kerry had spoken to Netanyahu, and that U.S. law enforcement was working in coordination with Israeli authorities.

Obama said the attacks “represent the kind of extremism that threatens to break all of the Middle East into the kind of spiral from which it is very difficult to emerge, and we know how this violence can get worse over time.”

“Too many Israelis have died, too many Palestinians have died,” Obama said.

This story was updated at 11:39 a.m.