A three-hour-long hostage situation at a Tunisian museum left 19 dead in the capital city of Tunis, according to The Guardian.

Interior ministry spokesman Mohamed Ali Aroui told the Wataniya TV station that 17 of the killed were foreign tourists and two were Tunisian. Three people from Poland were wounded, according to country's foreign ministry.

The shooting at the museum occurred at about noon local time on Wednesday, at the Bardo national museum, reports say.

The situation took over three hours to end. When it was finally over, two gunmen and a security officer had been killed and all of the hostages had been freed, according to an interior ministry spokesman.

The New York Times reports that security forces went into the museum and killed the two gunmen.

During the crisis situation, police snipers dressed in all black were on top of the roofs and bastions of the ancient Bardot castle.

A low-flying helicopter circled the museum as several hundred people gathered outside the museum's gates. Police and ambulance sirens could be heard wailing.

The attack on the museum occurred one day after Tunisia announced a major weapons seizure from jihadi groups. Some speculated that the attack on the museum was launched by jihadist groups seeking revenge for the weapons seizure.

The Bardo museum is one of the country's biggest tourist transactions. The museum details Tunisia's history and also includes one of the world's largest collections of Roman mosaics.

The Italian foreign ministry said that two Italians may have been wounded in the attack. They were waiting on confirmation of the wounded in the attack. They said that 100 Italians were safe and being protected by the police after being rescued from the museum.

The Bardo museum is located near the Parliament in downtown Tunis. The Parliament was evacuated and police officers surrounded the area.