Israeli PM orders killers' homes destroyed Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has condemned as "human animals" the Palestinian attackers who killed four rabbis worshipping at a Jerusalem synagogue. Two Palestinians armed with an axe, knives and a pistol killed the four and injured eight other people, including two police officers, before being shot dead by Israeli police. Hours after the attack one of the Israeli policeman died, bringing the number of dead to five, news reports said. Police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said that the dead included three US citizens and one Briton. The victims - Aryeh Kopinsky, 43, Avraham Shmuel Goldberg, 68, Kalman Levine, 55, and Moshe Twersky, 59 - all also held Israeli citizenship. The Israeli police officer was identified as Zidan Nahad Seif by Haaretz newspaper. Netanyahu told a press conference in Jerusalem on Tuesday evening the attackers were "human animals" and he had ordered their homes to be demolished, increased security in Jerusalem and asked Israelis to increase their vigilance. Netanyahu said he was shocked by what he said were the cries of "glee and joy" in Gaza on the news of the killings. He said Israel was in the middle of a war against terrorism, but that "we always beat it." He said: "It is a battle for Jerusalem, our eternal capital. We have to unite, to defend Jerusalem, to stand together. The police responded to a 7am emergency call from the synagogue in Har Nof, a predominantly ultra-Orthodox neighbourhood of West Jerusalem, and engaged in a gunfight with assailants who had attacked during morning prayers. Pictures from inside the synagogue showed bodies and bloodstained prayer shawls on the tile floor. A bloody axe lay next to one of the bodies of the dead attackers outside. I heard shots. All the worshippers ducked onto the floor and then I saw two terrorists coming in. One had a gun... Both started running after people with axes," said a survivor, Yizhak Hesh. The radical Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine movement said two of its members, Ghassan and Udai Abu Jamal, cousins from the East Jerusalem neighbourhood of Jabal al-Mukkaber, carried out the attack. Its armed wing, the Abu Ali Mustafa Brigades, praised them in a statement as "martyrs," and called for an escalation of "confrontations with (Israeli) occupiers and settlers." Hamas also hailed the attack, saying in a statement that "Hamas blesses the heroic attack in Jerusalem and highly appreciates and esteems the attackers." Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas condemned the incident, and called for a halt to all attacks. However, in an earlier statement, he had laid the blame for the increasing violence upon Israeli intrusions into the Jerusalem compound that houses the al-Aqsa mosque, Islam's third-holiest site. According to long-standing arrangements, Jews may visit the site as tourists, but not pray there. However, some Jewish groups have been pushing for expanded access, leading to tension in recent weeks. In turn, Netanyahu blamed the violence on incitement by Abbas, who governs the West Bank, as well as on Hamas group, which runs the Gaza Strip. "We will respond with a heavy hand to the brutal murder of Jews who came to pray and were met by reprehensible murderers," he said. But Yoram Cohen, the head of Israel's Shin Bet security agency, tried to temper statements about Abbas made by Netanyahu. "Abu Mazen (Abbas) is not interested in terrorism and is not inciting violence, not even underhandedly, although a part of the public construes his statements as such," he said.