A 16-year-old attacker was shot dead by a Serbian gendarme outside the Israeli Embassy in Belgrade early Wednesday after he charged the officer with two knives and shouted "Allahu Akbar," Serbian Interior Minister Ivica Dacic said.

The officer suffered a light head wound but killed the assailant in self-defense. Authorities described the incident as a terrorist attack and raised Serbia's security threat level to the highest "red" alert, increasing police presence at key sites.

Dacic stated that security services had been monitoring the still-unidentified minor, suspected to be from Šabac, prior to the attack. His Instagram profile reportedly featured a black flag and symbols associated with the Islamic State, and he was known as a supporter of the group.

The attack occurred just after midnight local time, marking the second assault on the Israeli Embassy in Belgrade in two years. In June 2024, a Serbian convert to Islam attacked a police officer with a crossbow at the same location before being shot dead.

No Israeli embassy staff were injured, as the mission was closed at the time. Israel's Foreign Ministry confirmed the absence of casualties among its personnel.

The incident unfolded amid vote counting in Israel's parliamentary elections, the first since the October 7, 2023, Hamas attacks. Serbian authorities continue to investigate the attacker's background and possible connections to radical Islamist networks.