Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has promised “a strong, swift and precise response” in the wake of escalating deadly violence in the occupied West Bank and the occupied East Jerusalem.

Netanyahu made the statement on Saturday as he convened his security cabinet over one of the deadliest attacks carried out by a Palestinian in years in the occupied East Jerusalem, which killed seven people on Friday.

Al Jazeera’s diplomatic editor, James Bays, reporting from occupied East Jerusalem, said that Israel’s Security Cabinet is expected to authorise action in response to the attack.

“There are two main branches of what is likely the Security Cabinet may authorise. The first is concerning the families and friends of those suspected of carrying out recent attacks,” Bays said.

“What they say they are going to do is to seal the homes of those people, and potentially arrest some, then demolish their homes and also revoke their permission to live in Jerusalem.”

Rise in inter-communal violence

Marwan Bishara, Al Jazeera’s senior political analyst, said arming civilians in Israel will further escalate the violence and deteriorate the security situation in Israel and Palestine.

“The escalation threatens to be worst than ever and it is just incredibly predictable,” he said.

“They are trying to further arm already armed people in Jerusalem, the West Bank, etc,” Bishara said, adding, “More violence and more suffering will only play to the hands of the most extreme of the extremes [groups] in Israel and potentially in Palestine.”