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Jerusalem (AFP)

Police in the Old City of Jerusalem on Friday shot a knife-wielding Israeli Arab man who tried to stab an officer near the Damascus Gate, a spokesman told AFP.

He was unable to say if the alleged assailant, described in a police statement as a "terrorist", was alive or dead but said that no police officers were hurt in the incident.

"We are saying at this time that he was shot and neutralised," he said, adding that the man was aged around 30 and from the northern Israeli town of Umm el-Fahm.

Israeli media said that he was shot dead.

A police statement said that the incident occurred shortly after the man had left the nearby Al-Aqsa mosque compound.

"After a few metres (yards) he came to a police team stationed there and attempted to stab one of them with a knife which he had in his hand," the Hebrew-language statement said.

"After a struggle between the police and the suspect he was shot by them and neutralised," it said.

After the incident police blocked access to the Al-Aqsa compound, a major flashpoint in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the scene of past violence.

The Old City is in mainly Palestinian east Jerusalem, occupied along with the West Bank since the 1967 Six-Day War.

© 2018 AFP