Man captured after Turkish embassy attack

A Palestinian man known to Israeli police was shot and wounded by Turkish embassy security guards after breaking into the mission in Tel Aviv and taking hostages. The man was subdued and Turkish diplomats questioned him for more than four hours before he limped out of the embassy handcuffed, accompanied by Turkish embassy staff members, an Israeli policeman and a paramedic. An ambulance took him to hospital.

An Israeli Arab lawyer who spoke to the man by phone to try to calm him down said the Palestinian had held hostage the Turkish consul-general and his wife for two hours. They managed to escape after Turkish security officers shot and wounded the Palestinian, who was armed with a gun and a knife.

Israeli officials declined to confirm the hostage-taking account.

The Israeli television station Channel 2 played a voice recording of the man, named as Nadim Injas, in which he said he would destroy the embassy unless he was given asylum in Turkey. He said he had weapons, explosives and gasoline.

Israeli media said it appeared the man had managed to enter the embassy through an open window on the ground floor.

An Israeli Foreign Ministry official said the man had been released from an Israeli jail two weeks ago after completing a four-year sentence for breaking into the British embassy in 2006 to demand asylum.