Both Palestinian assailants were taken into custody.
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Much of the violence has emanated from Hebron, the largest West Bank city, where hundreds of Israeli settlers live in heavily-guarded enclaves surrounded by tens of thousands of Palestinians. Israel accuses Palestinian leaders of inciting the unrest.
Locals identified the attacker to Ma’an as Raed Mohammad Jabara al-Masalma from Beit Awwa village west of Hebron.
The attack followed an earlier assault Thursday when a Palestinian stabbed Israelis at an office building in Tel Aviv.
Witness Shimon Vaknin told the Jerusalem Post that the prayer service had just begun when a man staggered in and collapsed on a number of worshippers.
“He was all slashed and bloody”. A blood-spattered floor was littered with plastic gloves.
Police spokeswoman Luba Samri said the stabbing attacks appeared to be ideologically driven, rather than criminal, and that police were sweeping the city of Kiryat Gat to try and apprehend the attacker.
The Israeli military said he then intentionally rammed his vehicle into a group of pedestrians.
Like a handful of other American Jews in their late teens, Ezra Schwartz went to Israel after high school graduation.
Police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said the attacker’s auto stopped when it hit another vehicle and the driver was seized.
The Jewish Agency for Israel, which runs a program called Masa Israel Journey, says Schwarz was a participant in the program.
The violence since the start of October has killed at least 84 people on the Palestinian side, including one Arab Israeli, and at least 15 Israelis. Maimonides said the school community was “profoundly saddened” and mourned his death.
The State Department confirmed a USA citizen was among those who died. But the attack in Israel’s economic hub of Tel Aviv returned the violence to the Israeli heartland, shattering a lull that had set in outside of the West Bank and stoking Israeli fears that a full-fledged Palestinian uprising could erupt.
The Palestinian killed in the attack has not been identified.
Those killed were men aged around 20 and 50, police said.
Thursday’s decision comes amid a two-month surge in Israeli-Palestinian violence that has killed 14 Israelis and at least 82 Palestinians.
Vaknin said the men inside shut the door and struggled for several minutes with the Palestinian, who tried to burst in.
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Mahmoud’s mother made her comments Thursday on Hamas television, the Times of Israel reported.
