Israeli military says it killed two attackers crossing from Jordan's Dead Sea area

The Israeli military said on Friday it had identified what it called "a number of terrorists" crossing from Jordan into Israel south of the Dead Sea region and had killed two of them after they opened fire on Israeli forces.

"IDF (Israel Defence Forces) troops were dispatched to the scene and two terrorists who opened fire toward the troops were neutralised by the forces," it said in a statement.

"Additional forces have been dispatched to reinforce the area and are conducting searches on the ground and air for an additional terrorist who likely fled the scene."

A military source with the General Command of the Jordanian Armed Forces said in a statement posted on its website that there was "no truth" in reports that Jordanian soldiers had crossed the western border of Jordan into Israel.

The Jordanian military stressed the necessity of receiving information from official sources and not circulating rumours, the source added.

The latest incident follows a separate attack on Sept. 8 when a gunman from Jordan killed three Israeli civilians at the Allenby Bridge border crossing in the occupied West Bank before security forces shot him dead.

Anti-Israeli sentiment runs high in Jordan, and the Allenby Bridge attack was the first of its kind along the border with Jordan since Oct. 7, 2023, when Palestinian Islamist group Hamas carried out an assault on southern Israel, sparking the war in Gaza that has escalated throughout the region.

Israel and Jordan signed a peace treaty in 1994 and have close security ties.

Dozens of trucks cross daily from Jordan, with goods from Jordan and the Gulf that supply both the West Bank and Israeli markets.