Israeli Border Police in Beersheba early Wednesday announced that they had thwarted a planned stabbing attack by a Palestinian, who they found hiding in an apartment in the northern Negev city.

The suspect, a resident of the West Bank city of Jenin, was handed over to the Israel Security Agency (Shin Bet) for questioning, a police spokesman told Xinhua.

Overnight, Israeli army forces also stopped a Gazan Palestinian infiltrator near the coastal enclave, which lies some 40 km away from Beersheba.

Officials said that both were tracked down according to intelligence information, which warned that they were planning to carry out an attack on the city's residents.

In a similar incident last week, the army raised a security alert over a potential attack by militants infiltrating into Israel from Gaza.

Troops closed off the area where the militants were believed to be hiding, and discovered two unarmed Palestinians.

The two, who said they were seeking work, were handed over to Shin Bet for questioning, according to the Ma'ariv daily.

Israel has kept alert for such incidents in the vicinity, after a combined terror attack by several militant squads from across the Egyptian border in August of last year that killed eight motorists and wounded some 30 others.