NAKBA II
Israel 'seems to be settling in for more West Bank raids'
Issued on: 29/08/2024 -
Issued on: 29/08/2024 -
Video by: Kethevane GORJESTANI
The Israeli military said on Thursday its troops killed five Palestinian fighters who were hiding inside a mosque in the West Bank city of Tulkarm, in one of the largest assaults on the occupied territory for months. France 24's international affairs editor Kethevane Gorjestani says it appears from reporting on the ground that the Israeli military is preparing for further operations in the West Bank.
The Israeli military said on Thursday its troops killed five Palestinian fighters who were hiding inside a mosque in the West Bank city of Tulkarm, in one of the largest assaults on the occupied territory for months. France 24's international affairs editor Kethevane Gorjestani says it appears from reporting on the ground that the Israeli military is preparing for further operations in the West Bank.
On the ground in the Middle East: 'An amazing level of violence'
Issued on: 29/08/2024
Video by: Cyril PAYEN
Senior reporter Cyril Payen, who spent three years in Jerusalem as France 24's Middle East correspondent, recently revisited the region for a two-week reporting trip. He reveals what it is like reporting on the ground in the region at a time when Israel's war with Hamas is threatening to spill over into a wider conflict and violence is increasing in the occupied West Bank.
Issued on: 29/08/2024
Video by: Cyril PAYEN
Senior reporter Cyril Payen, who spent three years in Jerusalem as France 24's Middle East correspondent, recently revisited the region for a two-week reporting trip. He reveals what it is like reporting on the ground in the region at a time when Israel's war with Hamas is threatening to spill over into a wider conflict and violence is increasing in the occupied West Bank.
Israel launches deadly West Bank operation as Gaza war drags on
By AFP
August 28, 2024
Israeli soldiers operate during a raid in the Nur Shams camp for Palestinian refugees near the city of Tulkarem in the Israeli-occupied West Bank - Copyright AFP GREG BAKER
Israel launched a large-scale military operation Wednesday in the occupied West Bank, where the army said it killed nine Palestinian fighters, while the nearly 11-month Gaza war showed no signs of abating.
Violence has surged in the West Bank during the Gaza war sparked by Palestinian Islamist group Hamas’s unprecedented October 7 attacks on Israel.
The war has killed more than 40,000 people in Gaza, according to the Hamas-run territory’s health ministry. It has also caused widespread destruction, displaced nearly all of Gaza’s 2.4 million people at least once and triggered a humanitarian crisis.
In the West Bank in the early hours of Wednesday, the Israeli military launched a series of coordinated raids across four cities — Jenin, Nablus, Tubas and Tulkarem.
Columns of Israeli armoured vehicles entered two refugee camps, in Tulkarem and Tubas, as well as Jenin.
By midday, they were blocking entrances to the towns and camps, AFP photographers said, with soldiers firing at the camps from which gunfire and explosions were heard.
Israeli bulldozers dug up the asphalt from the streets, with the army saying it was looking for roadside bombs.
The Palestinian Red Crescent said Israeli forces killed at least 10 people — two in Jenin, four in a nearby village and another four in the refugee camp near Tubas. Fifteen others were wounded.
Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas cut short a visit to Saudi Arabia and headed home to “follow up on the latest developments in light of the Israeli aggression on the northern West Bank,” Palestinian official media said.
The Israeli army said it had killed nine Palestinian “terrorists” and that so far there were no casualties on its side.
Soldiers encountered explosives and were exchanging fire with militants, said army spokesman, Nadav Shoshani. He declined to say how many were involved or how long the operation would last.
The operation, he added, was not “extremely different (from usual army activity in the area) or special”.
– ‘This is war’ –
Foreign Minster Israel Katz had a different take, however, saying the military was “operating in full force since last night” in a bid to “dismantle Iranian-Islamic terror infrastructure”.
In a post on X, he accused Iran, Israel’s main foe in the region, of seeking to “establish an eastern front against Israel” based on the “model” for Gaza and Lebanon, where it backs Hamas and Hezbollah, respectively.
“We must address this threat with the same determination used against terror infrastructures in Gaza, including temporary evacuation of residents and any necessary measures,” he said.
“This is a war, and we must win it.”
Since Hamas’s October 7 attack, Israeli troops or settlers have killed more than 650 Palestinians in the West Bank, according to an AFP tally based on Palestinian health ministry figures.
During the same period, at least 19 Israelis have been killed in Palestinian attacks, according to Israeli officials.
But while Israeli military operations have become a daily occurrence in the West Bank, occupied by Israel since 1967, it is rare for them to be carried out in multiple cities simultaneously.
In recent weeks, Israeli operations in the West Bank have focused on the north of the territory, where armed groups fighting against Israel are particularly active.
– Patients flee hospital –
Last week, the army announced it had killed a senior Palestinian militant in Lebanon, accusing him of “directing attacks and smuggling weapons” to the West Bank and collaborating with Iranian forces.
Islamic Jihad, a Palestinian Islamist movement allied with Hamas which has a strong presence in the north of the West Bank, issued a statement early Wednesday denouncing an “open war” by Israel.
“With this aggression, which 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,” the statement said.
Hamas, whose popularity has soared in the West Bank since the start of the Gaza war, late Tuesday reiterated its call for Palestinians in the territory to “rise up”.
Its statement came in response to comments by far-right Israeli National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir, who said this week he would build a synagogue at Jerusalem’s flashpoint Al-Aqsa mosque compound if he could.
Ben Gvir, a settler himself, has openly called for the annexation of the West Bank.
In Gaza, families in distress continued to move according to the Israeli army’s evacuation orders.
One of the latest targeted the area around Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Hospital in Deir el-Balah in central Gaza, from which “nearly 650 patients have fled”, Doctors Without Borders said.
The medical charity has, instead, “anticipated the opening of a field hospital now that the Al-Aqsa hospital was “almost totally empty”.
Gaza’s civil defence agency reported at least 12 dead, including at least one child and a woman, in new Israeli strikes.
Hamas’s October 7 attack resulted in the deaths of 1,199 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on Israeli official figures.
Israel’s retaliatory military campaign has killed at least 40,534 people in Gaza, according to the territory’s health ministry. The UN rights office says most of the dead are women and children.
burs-dv/kir
Israel says it ‘eliminated’ local Palestinian commander in West Bank military operation
The Israeli military on Thursday said it had killed Mohammed Jaber and four more Palestinian militants in a major military operation in the occupied West Bank. Jaber, known as Abu Shujaa, was a leader of the Tulkarem Battalion, a local militant group allied to the Islamic Jihad. There was no immediate Palestinian confirmation of his death.
Issued on: 29/08/2024 -
Israel army says killed 5 Palestinian militants on day two of West Bank raids
Tulkarem (Palestinian Territories) (AFP) – The Israeli military said its forces killed five Palestinian militants in the occupied West Bank on Thursday in a second day of "counter-terrorism" operations that have killed 14 in total.
Issued on: 29/08/2024 -
The Israeli military on Thursday said it had killed Mohammed Jaber and four more Palestinian militants in a major military operation in the occupied West Bank. Jaber, known as Abu Shujaa, was a leader of the Tulkarem Battalion, a local militant group allied to the Islamic Jihad. There was no immediate Palestinian confirmation of his death.
Issued on: 29/08/2024 -
An Israeli soldier aims his rifle while positioned at a gateway during a military operation in Tulkarm in the West Bank on August 29, 2024.
© Jaafar Ashtiyeh, AFP
The Israeli military said it has killed five more militants in a large-scale operation in the occupied West Bank early Thursday, including a well-known local commander.
There was no immediate Palestinian confirmation of the death of Mohammed Jaber, known as Abu Shujaa, a commander in the Islamic Jihad militant group in the Nur Shams refugee camp on the outskirts of the city of Tulkarem.
He became a hero for many Palestinians earlier this year when he was reported killed in an Israeli operation, only to make a surprise appearance at the funeral of other militants, where he was hoisted onto the shoulders of a cheering crowd.
The military said he was killed along with four other militants in a shootout with Israeli forces early Thursday after the five had hidden inside a mosque. It said Abu Shujaa was linked to numerous attacks on Israelis, including a deadly shooting in June, and was planning more.
The military said another militant was arrested in the operation in Tulkarem, and that a member of Israel's paramilitary Border Police was lightly wounded.
Israel launched a large-scale operation in the West Bank overnight into Wednesday. Hamas said 10 of its fighters were killed in different locations, and the Palestinian Health Ministry reported an 11th casualty, without saying whether he was a fighter or a civilian.
Violence has surged in the West Bank since Hamas' Oct. 7 attack out of Gaza ignited the war there.
Nur Shams is among several built-up refugee camps across the Middle East that date back to the 1948 war surrounding Israel's creation, in which around 700,000 Palestinians fled or were driven out of what is now Israel. Many of the camps are militant strongholds.
Israel captured the West Bank, the Gaza Strip and east Jerusalem in the 1967 Mideast war, and the Palestinians want all three territories for their future state.
The 3 million Palestinians in the West Bank live under seemingly open-ended Israeli military rule, with the Western-backed Palestinian Authority administering towns and cities. Over 500,000 Jewish settlers, who have Israeli citizenship, live in well over 100 settlements across the territory that most of the international community considers illegal.
(AP)
The Israeli military said it has killed five more militants in a large-scale operation in the occupied West Bank early Thursday, including a well-known local commander.
There was no immediate Palestinian confirmation of the death of Mohammed Jaber, known as Abu Shujaa, a commander in the Islamic Jihad militant group in the Nur Shams refugee camp on the outskirts of the city of Tulkarem.
He became a hero for many Palestinians earlier this year when he was reported killed in an Israeli operation, only to make a surprise appearance at the funeral of other militants, where he was hoisted onto the shoulders of a cheering crowd.
The military said he was killed along with four other militants in a shootout with Israeli forces early Thursday after the five had hidden inside a mosque. It said Abu Shujaa was linked to numerous attacks on Israelis, including a deadly shooting in June, and was planning more.
The military said another militant was arrested in the operation in Tulkarem, and that a member of Israel's paramilitary Border Police was lightly wounded.
Israel launched a large-scale operation in the West Bank overnight into Wednesday. Hamas said 10 of its fighters were killed in different locations, and the Palestinian Health Ministry reported an 11th casualty, without saying whether he was a fighter or a civilian.
Violence has surged in the West Bank since Hamas' Oct. 7 attack out of Gaza ignited the war there.
Nur Shams is among several built-up refugee camps across the Middle East that date back to the 1948 war surrounding Israel's creation, in which around 700,000 Palestinians fled or were driven out of what is now Israel. Many of the camps are militant strongholds.
Israel captured the West Bank, the Gaza Strip and east Jerusalem in the 1967 Mideast war, and the Palestinians want all three territories for their future state.
The 3 million Palestinians in the West Bank live under seemingly open-ended Israeli military rule, with the Western-backed Palestinian Authority administering towns and cities. Over 500,000 Jewish settlers, who have Israeli citizenship, live in well over 100 settlements across the territory that most of the international community considers illegal.
(AP)
Israel army says killed 5 Palestinian militants on day two of West Bank raids
Tulkarem (Palestinian Territories) (AFP) – The Israeli military said its forces killed five Palestinian militants in the occupied West Bank on Thursday in a second day of "counter-terrorism" operations that have killed 14 in total.
Issued on: 29/08/2024 -
An Israeli soldier takes position during a raid on the West Bank city of Tulkarem on the second day of a major military operation in the north of the occupied territory
© Jaafar ASHTIYEH / AFP
"Following exchanges of fire, the forces eliminated five terrorists who had hidden inside a mosque" in Tulkarem on Thursday morning, the military said.
On Wednesday, the military said it killed nine militants in simultaneous raids in several West Bank cities and refugee camps.
The Palestinian health ministry reported 12 deaths since the start of the operation.
Witnesses told AFP that Israeli forces had withdrawn from Al-Farra camp in Tubas where several Palestinians were killed on Wednesday.
An AFP photographer reported that clashes were still taking place in Jenin as he saw a drone flying overhead.
"Following exchanges of fire, the forces eliminated five terrorists who had hidden inside a mosque" in Tulkarem on Thursday morning, the military said.
On Wednesday, the military said it killed nine militants in simultaneous raids in several West Bank cities and refugee camps.
The Palestinian health ministry reported 12 deaths since the start of the operation.
Witnesses told AFP that Israeli forces had withdrawn from Al-Farra camp in Tubas where several Palestinians were killed on Wednesday.
An AFP photographer reported that clashes were still taking place in Jenin as he saw a drone flying overhead.
An Israeli army bulldozer strips the asphalt from a road in Tulkarem as a precaution against concealed explosives
© Jaafar ASHTIYEH / AFP
Israeli soldiers were also continuing to operate in Tulkarem, another AFP journalist reported.
Since Hamas's unprecedented October 7 attack on Israel triggered war in Gaza, violence has flared in the West Bank, a Palestinian territory occupied by Israel since 1967 and separated geographically from Gaza by Israeli territory.
Since the start of Gaza war, at least 637 Palestinians have been killed in the West Bank by Israeli troops or settlers, according to UN figures.
At least 19 Israelis, including soldiers, have been killed in Palestinian attacks or during army operations in the West Bank, according to Israeli official figures.
© 2024 AFP
Israeli soldiers were also continuing to operate in Tulkarem, another AFP journalist reported.
Since Hamas's unprecedented October 7 attack on Israel triggered war in Gaza, violence has flared in the West Bank, a Palestinian territory occupied by Israel since 1967 and separated geographically from Gaza by Israeli territory.
Since the start of Gaza war, at least 637 Palestinians have been killed in the West Bank by Israeli troops or settlers, according to UN figures.
At least 19 Israelis, including soldiers, have been killed in Palestinian attacks or during army operations in the West Bank, according to Israeli official figures.
© 2024 AFP
US slaps new sanctions on Israeli settlers over West Bank violence
By AFP
August 28, 2024
Activists try to reach a land confiscated by Israeli settlers in the al-Makhrur area, near Beit Jala in the Israeli occupied West Bank, on August 15, 2024 - Copyright AFP/File HAZEM BADER
Shaun TANDON
The United States on Wednesday announced new sanctions on West Bank settlers over violence against Palestinians, urging greater accountability efforts by its ally Israel, which responded with anger to the move.
The sanctions were announced on the same day that Israel launched a wide-scale attack on the West Bank that it said killed nine Palestinian fighters, despite warnings by President Joe Biden’s administration against expanding the war in Gaza.
“Extremist settler violence in the West Bank causes intense human suffering, harms Israel’s security and undermines the prospect for peace and stability in the region,” State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said in a statement.
“It is critical that the government of Israel hold accountable any individuals and entities responsible for violence against civilians in the West Bank,” he said.
The latest sanction targets included Hashomer Yosh, an Israeli group that has supported the unauthorized settler outpost of Meitarim Farm in the south Hebron Hills.
Volunteers from the group earlier this year fenced off a village whose 250 Palestinian residents had all been forced to leave, the State Department said.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who relies on support from far-right politicians who advocate for the establishment of new settlements on Palestinian land, denounced the move.
“Israel views with utmost severity the imposition of sanctions on citizens of Israel. The issue is in a pointed discussion with the US,” Netanyahu’s office said in a statement.
Hashomer Yosh’s website, using the biblical name for the West Bank, says the group helps “various farmers throughout Judea and Samaria, who bravely protect our lands and stand strong in the face of economic difficulties and frequent agricultural crime.”
The Israeli settlements in the West Bank are illegal under international law.
The State Department also imposed sanctions against Yitzhak Levi Filant, who was accused of leading armed settlers in setting up roadblocks and patrols with a goal of attacking Palestinians.
Since Hamas’s unprecedented October 7 attack on Israel triggered war in Gaza, Israeli forces have also stepped up operations in the West Bank, a Palestinian territory occupied by Israel since 1967 and separated geographically from Gaza by Israeli territory.
At least 640 Palestinians have been killed in the West Bank by Israeli troops or settlers since the start of the Gaza war, according to an AFP count based on Palestinian official figures.
The Biden administration has repeatedly voiced concern to Netanyahu about settler violence and about the expansion of settlements, but has made little impact on the Israeli government’s decision-making.
Last month, the United States imposed sanctions on Lehava, a group of more than 10,000 members, which the State Department described as the “largest violent extremist organization in Israel.”
US sanctions generally bar targets from the US financial system, leading Israeli banks to restrict dealings with sanctioned individuals for fear of repercussions.
The Biden administration, which has been pushing for a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, has held off on imposing sanctions on government ministers leading the settlement policy.
Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, who also heads civil affairs at the defense ministry, earlier this month approved a new settlement on a UNESCO World Heritage Site near Bethlehem, saying he wanted to “fight against the dangerous project of creating a Palestinian state by creating facts on the ground.”
By AFP
August 28, 2024
Activists try to reach a land confiscated by Israeli settlers in the al-Makhrur area, near Beit Jala in the Israeli occupied West Bank, on August 15, 2024 - Copyright AFP/File HAZEM BADER
Shaun TANDON
The United States on Wednesday announced new sanctions on West Bank settlers over violence against Palestinians, urging greater accountability efforts by its ally Israel, which responded with anger to the move.
The sanctions were announced on the same day that Israel launched a wide-scale attack on the West Bank that it said killed nine Palestinian fighters, despite warnings by President Joe Biden’s administration against expanding the war in Gaza.
“Extremist settler violence in the West Bank causes intense human suffering, harms Israel’s security and undermines the prospect for peace and stability in the region,” State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said in a statement.
“It is critical that the government of Israel hold accountable any individuals and entities responsible for violence against civilians in the West Bank,” he said.
The latest sanction targets included Hashomer Yosh, an Israeli group that has supported the unauthorized settler outpost of Meitarim Farm in the south Hebron Hills.
Volunteers from the group earlier this year fenced off a village whose 250 Palestinian residents had all been forced to leave, the State Department said.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who relies on support from far-right politicians who advocate for the establishment of new settlements on Palestinian land, denounced the move.
“Israel views with utmost severity the imposition of sanctions on citizens of Israel. The issue is in a pointed discussion with the US,” Netanyahu’s office said in a statement.
Hashomer Yosh’s website, using the biblical name for the West Bank, says the group helps “various farmers throughout Judea and Samaria, who bravely protect our lands and stand strong in the face of economic difficulties and frequent agricultural crime.”
The Israeli settlements in the West Bank are illegal under international law.
The State Department also imposed sanctions against Yitzhak Levi Filant, who was accused of leading armed settlers in setting up roadblocks and patrols with a goal of attacking Palestinians.
Since Hamas’s unprecedented October 7 attack on Israel triggered war in Gaza, Israeli forces have also stepped up operations in the West Bank, a Palestinian territory occupied by Israel since 1967 and separated geographically from Gaza by Israeli territory.
At least 640 Palestinians have been killed in the West Bank by Israeli troops or settlers since the start of the Gaza war, according to an AFP count based on Palestinian official figures.
The Biden administration has repeatedly voiced concern to Netanyahu about settler violence and about the expansion of settlements, but has made little impact on the Israeli government’s decision-making.
Last month, the United States imposed sanctions on Lehava, a group of more than 10,000 members, which the State Department described as the “largest violent extremist organization in Israel.”
US sanctions generally bar targets from the US financial system, leading Israeli banks to restrict dealings with sanctioned individuals for fear of repercussions.
The Biden administration, which has been pushing for a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, has held off on imposing sanctions on government ministers leading the settlement policy.
Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, who also heads civil affairs at the defense ministry, earlier this month approved a new settlement on a UNESCO World Heritage Site near Bethlehem, saying he wanted to “fight against the dangerous project of creating a Palestinian state by creating facts on the ground.”
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