Serbian Officer Shoots Knife-Wielding Minor Dead Outside Israeli Embassy in Belgrade

A teenager with two knives charged a Serbian police officer guarding the Israeli Embassy in Belgrade just after midnight on Wednesday, Oct. 28. The officer shot him dead.

Serbia's outgoing Interior Minister Ivica Dacic said police are treating it as a terrorist attack. Serbia has raised its terror threat to the highest level, red.

What happened at the embassy

The Higher Public Prosecutor's Office in Belgrade put the time at about 12:15 a.m. local time. Its account: a person dressed in black opened the door of the guard booth in front of the embassy and rushed the officer inside with two knives.

The attacker threw one knife at the officer, identified only by the initials D.S. It hit him in the left cheek. D.S. drew his service weapon and fired several shots, killing the attacker on the spot.

Prosecutors classified the shooting as justified self-defense. They said the investigation into the full circumstances is continuing.

Dacic said the attacker shouted "Allahu Akbar" as he went for the officer, a member of the Gendarmerie, the elite unit that guards the mission. The officer was lightly wounded.

The Israeli Foreign Ministry confirmed what it called an attempted terrorist attack. "The attacker was neutralized by local police," it said. "No embassy personnel were injured, and the mission was closed at the time of the incident."

The attacker

Dacic said the attacker was a minor whose identity has not yet been formally established. He said the boy is reasonably suspected to be from Šabac, in western Serbia.

Bloomberg reported the attacker was 16 and is presumed to have acted alone. Serbian authorities have not publicly confirmed either detail.

Dacic said Serbian security services had been monitoring the suspect, whom he described as an Islamic State supporter. According to Dacic, the boy "kept the black flag in support of the Islamic State on his Instagram" account.

The claim that security services were already watching him raises its own questions. Dacic has not said what the monitoring involved or why it did not stop an armed approach to a guarded embassy.

Alert level raised

Under the red alert, Dacic said, Serbia will see tighter security checks and a heavier police presence at sensitive sites. That includes infrastructure facilities and places where large crowds gather.

The embassy sits in an upscale Belgrade district not far from the U.S. Embassy. Police sealed off the area around the booth with tape, and Gendarmerie members stood guard at the entrance after the attack.

A second hit on the same embassy

This is the second attack on the Israeli Embassy in Belgrade in about two years. In June 2024, an attacker with a crossbow wounded a police officer guarding the mission. Police shot that assailant dead.

Serbia has maintained close relations with Israel. Attacks of this kind are rare in the country.

Timing amid two elections

The attack came three days after Serbia's early parliamentary election on Sunday, Oct. 25. A youth-led movement defeated former President Aleksandar Vucic's long-dominant camp after nearly two years of anti-government protests.

A new government has not been formed. Vucic and his allies remain in a caretaker role and still control the police. Dacic is the outgoing interior minister.

Israel held its own parliamentary election on Tuesday, Oct. 27. Exit polls showed no clear winner, and projected results showed the opposition bloc neck and neck with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's camp.

Serbian authorities have not said whether the attack has any connection to either vote. No source has linked the attack to either election.

What comes next

The prosecutor's investigation is ongoing. It has to settle the attacker's identity, confirm his age and hometown, and establish whether anyone else was involved. Serbian authorities have not yet formally resolved any of those points.

The red alert stays in force while the country waits for a new government to take over the same security services that were already tracking this suspect.