TWO teenage Palestinian girls were detained by Israeli occupation forces yesterday for alleged knife attacks.

The arrests came hours after three Palestinian members of the Knesset, the Israeli parliament, were suspended on the orders of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

In East Jerusalem’s old city, Israeli border police approached a 16-year-old girl at the Damascus Gate who was “moving in a suspicious way,” Israeli police spokeswoman Luba al-Samri said.

Officers claimed that on asking the girl to open her bag for inspection she produced a knife and tried to stab them.

Ms Samri said the girl, who lived locally, was “quickly controlled without injuries.”

Later on a 13-year-old girl was detained near Israel’s illegal Karmei Tzur settlement, north of Hebron in the occupied West Bank.

An Israeli army spokesman told the Ma’an news agency that a security guard at the settlement had “searched the suspect and identified a knife,” before arresting her.

Settlement bloc Gush Etzion regional council Mayor Davidi Perl blamed the Palestinian government for the incident.

“A girl who leaves her home to stab Jews instead of leaving for school is the result of years of ongoing incitement by the Palestinian Authority,” he said, calling on the Israeli government to “move from defence to attack.”

On Monday night the Knesset’s ethics committee suspended MPs Hanin Zoabi and Basel Ghattas from plenary sessions and committee hearings for four months and Jamal Zahalka for two months.

They can still vote in the plenum and in committees.

The action was taken against the three Joint Arab List MPs after they visited the families of alleged knife attackers whose dead bodies had not been returned by Israel for burial.

At Sunday’s weekly cabinet meeting Mr Netanyahu said he had asked Israel’s attorney general to take legal action against them for “going to comfort the families of murderers.”

He said: “I would like to examine new and reinforced legislative changes to ensure that anyone who acts in this direction will not serve in the Israeli Knesset.”

A draft Bill was submitted on Monday allowing MPs to be suspended by a three-quarters vote of the house.