Large Israeli military operation in the West Bank, nine Palestinians killed

Israel launched a large-scale military operation in the northern occupied West Bank on Wednesday, killing nine Palestinians, all fighters according to the Israeli army, on the sidelines of the war that has been going on in Gaza for nearly eleven months.

Israeli forces “eliminated nine armed terrorists” in Jenin, Tubas and Tulkarem, including seven in air raids, the army announced in a statement. The Palestinian Red Crescent reported “nine dead” and at least 15 injured in the attacks, revising downwards its previous toll of 10 dead.

According to Hamas, three of the dead in the Jenin refugee camp were members of its military wing.

In Gaza, Israeli bombardments from the air, sea and ground have been uninterrupted since Hamas' deadly attack on Israel on October 7. But in the West Bank, coordinated operations by ground troops supported by aircraft operating in several cities at the same time are rare.

A spokesman for the Israeli army, however, downplayed the significance of the operation, saying it was not “extremely different [from the usual] or special.”

According to the official Palestinian agency Wafa, the president of the Palestinian Authority, Mahmoud Abbas, interrupted an official visit to Saudi Arabia to return “to follow the developments of the Israeli aggression” in the West Bank.

During the night, columns of Israeli armored vehicles entered two refugee camps, in Tulkarem and Tubas, as well as the city of Jenin.

By midday, they were locking the entrances to the cities and camps, AFP photographers noted, with soldiers firing at regular intervals on the camps, from which the sounds of gunfire and explosions could be heard.

In the streets deserted by the inhabitants, Israeli bulldozers were destroying the roadway, with the army claiming to be digging up bombs planted on the side of the road. Ambulances were driving around, after being checked by soldiers.

– “Dangerous signal” –

Mostafa Taqataqa, governor of Tulkarem, told AFP that he saw the raids as “a dangerous and unprecedented signal.”

“The (Israeli) army destroyed the infrastructure network of the Nour Shams camp and cut it off from the city and its surroundings. It is clear that (the Israelis) have a plan that targets (…) all the camps in the West Bank, everything seems to indicate that this operation will last,” he added.

Israeli incursions into Palestinian autonomous areas are a daily occurrence in the West Bank, even though, under the (moribund) Israeli-Palestinian Oslo peace accords, the Israeli army is not supposed to enter these areas, which are under the exclusive control of the Palestinian Authority's Preventive Security.

Israeli soldiers on operations during a raid in the Palestinian refugee camp of Nour Shams, near the city of Tulkarem, in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, on August 28, 2024 © AFP – JAAFAR ASHTIYEH

Since the start of the war between Israel and Hamas, triggered by the bloody attack of the Palestinian Islamist movement in Israel on October 7, violence in the West Bank, occupied by Israel since 1967, has intensified significantly.

More than 600 Palestinians have been killed there by the Israeli army or Jewish settlers, according to official Palestinian data, and at least 20 Israelis, including soldiers, have died in Palestinian attacks or during army operations in the Palestinian autonomous zone, according to official Israeli data.

In recent weeks, Israeli operations in the West Bank have focused on the north of the territory, where armed groups fighting against Israel have been particularly active since well before the start of the Gaza war.

– “Iranian-Islamist infrastructures” –

Israeli army armored vehicles drive on a road during a raid on the Palestinian refugee camp of al-Faraa, near the city of Tubas in the occupied West Bank, on August 28, 2024 © AFP – Zain JAAFAR

The army wants to “dismantle the Iranian-Islamist terrorist infrastructure” in the West Bank, Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz said on X, calling for action in the West Bank “with the same determination (…) as in Gaza, with temporary evacuations of Palestinians.”

Ezzat Rishq, a Hamas official, saw this as a call to “widen the spiral of destruction and genocide.”

“This is a war, and we must win it,” added Mr. Katz, accusing Iran of wanting to “establish a terrorist front” in the West Bank, “on the model of Gaza and Lebanon,” where Hezbollah, a major ally of Tehran, has been firing rockets at Israel almost daily since October 8.

The Israeli army announced that it had “eliminated” five Palestinian fighters in an air raid on the Nour Shams refugee camp on Monday evening.

One of them, Jibril Jibril, “involved in terrorist activities (…) was released in November as part of the agreement” to exchange hostages kidnapped on October 7 and taken to Gaza for Palestinian prisoners incarcerated by Israel, the army said. According to Wafa, two of the five dead on Monday were minors.

– “Annexing the West Bank” –

Palestinians inspect the damage caused by a bombing on Khan Younis, in the southern Gaza Strip, on August 27, 2024 © AFP – Bashar TALEB

Islamic Jihad, a Palestinian Islamist movement allied with Hamas, denounced an “open war by the Israeli occupier.”

“With this aggression that aims to transfer the weight of the conflict to the occupied West Bank, the occupier wants to impose a new state of affairs on the ground to annex the West Bank,” it accused.

For its part, Hamas, whose popularity has risen in the West Bank since the start of the war in Gaza, while that of Fatah, Mr. Abbas' party, has fallen, again urged the three million Palestinians in the West Bank on Tuesday evening to “rise up” against the Israeli occupation.

In the Gaza Strip, the Civil Defense reported at least 12 deaths, including at least one child and a woman, in new Israeli strikes on the center and the south.

Photo released by the Israeli army on August 28, 2024, showing, according to it, soldiers in a building during search and destruction operations for a tunnel in the central Gaza Strip, where a war is taking place between Israel and the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas © Israeli Army – –

Families in distress continue to move according to the evacuation orders of the Israeli army which are multiplying. One of the latest concerns the area around the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in Deir al-Balah (center), which “nearly 650 patients have fled,” reported Doctors Without Borders (MSF) on Wednesday.

The mediators between Israel and Hamas, Qatar, Egypt and the United States, are trying to obtain a ceasefire accompanied by the release of hostages in exchange for Palestinian prisoners held by Israel.

After negotiations in Cairo, an Israeli delegation is holding discussions on Wednesday in Doha at the “technical level” with the mediators, according to a source familiar with the negotiations.

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