An Israeli border policeman fires rubber coated bullets during clashes with Palestinian protesters during clashes near Ramallah, West Bank, in this Oct. 23, 2015 photo.

Hawkish Israeli leader Benjamin Netanyahu has raised the possibility of revoking benefits and travel rights of some Palestinians living in East Jerusalem, a government official said on Monday, in response to a wave of violence.

Such a move did not appear to be imminent or even politically feasible but its mere mention ran counter to a decades-old Israeli assertion that Jerusalem is a united city where Arab and Jewish residents enjoy equal rights.

Israel regards all the city, including East Jerusalem, which was usurped along with the West Bank in 1967, as its indivisible capital. Unlike their brethren in the occupied West Bank, Palestinians in East Jerusalem receive Israeli social benefits and can move freely in Israel.

Many of the Arab assailants in one of the worst waves of Palestinian-Israeli street violence in decades have come from East Jerusalem.

Many of the Palestinian attacks on Israelis are now occurring in the West Bank, rather than in Jerusalem where they started. Israeli forces on Monday shot dead a Palestinian assailant who the army said had stabbed and wounded a soldier at an intersection near the town of Hebron. Since Oct. 1, at least 54 Palestinians, half of whom Israel says were assailants, have been shot and killed by Israelis at the scene of attacks or during protests in the West Bank and Gaza. Israeli police say 10 Israelis have been killed in Palestinian stabbings or shootings.

Citing comments at a security cabinet meeting held two weeks ago, the government official said Netanyahu mentioned the possibility of revoking some rights for Palestinians who live within Jerusalem’s municipal borders but outside the barrier Israel built during a Palestinian suicide bombing campaign a decade ago.

Rights groups estimate that around 100,000, or almost a third of Jerusalem’s Palestinians, live beyond the barrier.

Rights groups and Palestinians in East Jerusalem have long complained of a paucity of municipal services, difficulties in receiving building permits and Israeli moves to revoke the residency of those who leave the city for extended periods.

Police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld confirmed the incident on Twitter, saying the attempted attack took place outside a shrine known to Jews as the Cave of the Patriarchs and to Muslims as the Ibrahimi Mosque.

Earlier on Monday a 19-year-old Israeli soldier was seriously wounded after being stabbed in the neck by a 20-year-old Palestinian who was shot dead.