Israeli forces killed at least seven Palestinians in the West Bank in the past 24 hours, local health officials said on Sunday, as violence surged in the occupied territory amid the fragile ceasefire in Gaza.
Four Palestinians, including a teenager, were shot dead by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) in the northern city of Jenin during a raid that began late on Saturday, the Palestinian health ministry said.
A pre-dawn air strike on the city was also reported to have killed a senior fighter from the Jenin Brigade, a local armed group, and wounded several others.
The Israeli military said the five Palestinians it killed in Jenin were militants. It added, without specifying further, that troops were backed by air power that struck and wounded Palestinians.
The Palestinian Islamic Jihad group claimed one of the men, identified as Asaad al-Damj, 33, as a member. No group immediately claimed any of the others killed as members.
Raid in Jenin refugee camp
The IDF said it carried out the raid in the Jenin refugee camp to detain a wanted Palestinian alleged to have been involved in the killing of an Israeli father and son at a West Bank car wash earlier this year.
The official Palestinian news agency Wafa said that Israeli forces stormed Jenin “from several directions, firing bullets and surrounding government hospitals and the headquarters of the Red Crescent Society”.
Israeli snipers were positioned on roofs and military bulldozers were damaging roads and infrastructure, Wafa reported.
Local media reports suggested that the Israeli army had surrounded Jenin’s public hospital and that soldiers were searching ambulances.
In the refugee camp, debris was strewn along the streets of the densely populated urban neighborhood and the wall of one house had a large hole in it.
A number of Palestinian factions called for a strike in Jenin on Sunday to “mourn the souls of the martyrs”, the WAFA said.
A sixth Palestinian was killed in Yatma, a village near the city of Nablus, and another, reported to be a teenager, was killed near a Jewish settlement outside the West Bank town of El Bireh, Palestinian officials said.
There was no immediate comment from Israel on either of those incidents.
239 Palestinians killed in West Bank
The IDF has conducted frequent military raids and arrested hundreds of Palestinians since the start of the war in Gaza.
Violence in the West Bank has surged in the wake of Hamas’s attack on Israel on Oct 7 and the IDF’s retaliatory invasion of the Gaza Strip.
Israeli forces have killed dozens of Palestinians and arrested hundreds in the West Bank. Jewish West Bank settlers have also stepped up attacks on Palestinians.
The intensified violence in the territory follows more than a year of escalating raids and arrests.
Before the Hamas attack, 2023 was already the deadliest year for Palestinians in the West Bank in over two decades.
Israeli forces have now killed 239 Palestinians in the territory since Oct 7, more than in any entire year since 2005, according to the United Nations.
Meanwhile, Palestinians have killed 24 civilians and members of the security services in the West Bank, the highest number in more than 15 years.
Rights groups have accused Israel of deepening its occupation of the West Bank amid the IDF’s bid to root out militants, closing down crossings between Palestinian towns and driving the territory’s already lacklustre economy to a halt.
