Thousands of mourners have gathered at an Israeli settlement in the occupied West Bank for the funeral of a British-Israeli woman who died after a shooting attack days earlier.
Israelis holding national flags lined the roads in the rain leading to the funeral for Lucy Dee in Kfar Etzion on Tuesday.
The 48-year-old, also known as Leah, died on Monday from wounds sustained on Friday when her car came under fire in the Jordan Valley. Two of her children, Rina, 16, and Maia, 20, were shot dead in the attack and buried on Sunday.
The family are residents of Efrat, another Israeli settlement in the West Bank.
Dozens of people have been killed during escalating Israeli-Palestinian violence in recent weeks. Israeli officials have not identified the gunman in Friday’s shooting who fled the scene.
Lucy’s husband, Rabbi Leo Dee, thanked those gathered at the funeral. “When we left our home and travelled through the streets of Efrat, and there were literally thousands of people waving flags as we passed by, we felt like the royal family at the coronation,” he said.
He was joined at the podium by his three remaining children. “You were airlifted from a murder scene. I can’t imagine the pain, physical and mental, if you were conscious in any way for that journey,” Leo Dee said in his eulogy.
Government ministers, including the settler Orit Struck, from the rightwing Religious Zionism party, were among the mourners.
Israel has occupied the West Bank since the 1967 six-day war and all settlements in the Palestinian territory are illegal under international law. After the deaths of the three dual British nationals, the UK’s foreign secretary, James Cleverly, tweeted that there could be “no justification” for the “senseless violence”.
The UK prime minister, Rishi Sunak, condemned the attack. He said: “The killing of British-Israeli citizens, Maia, Rina and Lucy Dee is abhorrent. The UK condemns this appalling attack on civilians and I send my deepest condolences to Rabbi Dee and his family. We continue to urge all sides to de-escalate tensions in Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories and end the deadly cycle of violence.”
The Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, on Monday vowed to “get all the evil terrorists who killed our citizens and they will be held accountable with no exception”. His remark came hours after Palestinian mourners gathered near Jericho for the funeral of a 15-year-old boy shot dead by Israeli forces during a raid in the Jordan Valley.
The conflict has this year claimed the lives of at least 94 Palestinians, 19 Israelis, one Ukrainian and one Italian, according to an AFP count based on Israeli and Palestinian official sources.
