At least 55 Palestinians have been killed in the occupied West Bank and east Jerusalem since the Israeli army launched its first jihadist-inspired attack on Israel
An Israeli soldier has died following a shooting at a military checkpoint in East Jerusalem on Saturday, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said on Twitter.
A suspect arrived at the Shuafat crossing and fired at the security forces, in addition a shot was fired from a passing vehicle. Border Guard forces are looking for suspects.
A male in serious condition and a female in mild condition were both treated by emergency services and taken to a hospital.
Most of the international community considers East Jerusalem to be an area occupied by the international community.
The IDF and its commanders regret any harm to the un involved civilians who are in a combat environment and are close to armed terrorists during exchanges of fire.
The youngest was 14-year-old Adel Ibrahim Daoud, shot on Friday near the separation wall between Israel and the West Bank, the Palestinian Ministry of Health said, according to Palestinian Authority news agency WAFA.
When asked about the death of Daoud, the Israel Defense Forces said that soldiers spotted a man who threw Molotov cocktails at them. The soldiers responded with live fire. A hit has been identified. The incident is under review.”
In the northern West Bank, Israeli troops killed 10 militant in a raid last month. On the following day, a Palestinian opened fire near a synagogue in Jerusalem, killing seven people.
At least 55 Palestinians have been killed in the West Bank and east Jerusalem this year, a pace that could exceed last year’s death toll. Last year, nearly 150 Palestinians were killed in the West Bank and east Jerusalem, making it the deadliest year in those areas since 2004, according to figures by the Israeli rights group B’Tselem.
The IDF said forces were in the Jenin refugee camp to arrest an “Islamic Jihad operative” who it claims was “involved in terrorist activities, planning and carrying out shooting attacks towards IDF soldiers in the area.”
Tensions between Israeli and Palestinians has been rising for months, following a series of attacks against Israelis that killed 19 people in the spring. In the last few weeks, there have been increased Palestinian attacks.
Israel has been regularly raiding cities and villages in the occupied West Bank, saying it is targeting militants and their weapon caches before they have the chance to cross into Israel and carry out attacks. The operation, dubbed “Breaking the Wave” by the IDF, was launched after a series of attacks on Israelis. There have been attacks on civilians in Israel and the West Bank so far this year, with at least twenty Israelis and foreigners killed.
The violence in the West Bank is creating a climate of fear and anger. It is crucial to reduce tensions immediately to open the space for crucial initiatives aimed at establishing a viable political horizon,” Wennesland said.
A terror attack on Israel’s West Bank neighborhood: a suicide bombing on the first day of Israeli civil society in Ramot, Israel
One explosion happened near a crowded bus stop on the edge of the city. Ramot, a settlement in the north, was the location for the second detonation about half an hour later. At least three people were wounded and one person died from their wounds, police said.
Aryeh Shechopek, a teenager who was heading to a Jewish seminary when the blast went off, has died, according to a notice. Shechopek was an Israeli citizen according to Canada’s Ambassador to Israel. There were differing reports on Shechopek’s age.
The violence occurred hours after the Palestinian attackers in the West Bank hospital carried out Israel’s citizen after a car crash. That could cause tension to increase.
Benjamin Netanyahu is holding coalition talks after national elections in Israel and is likely to be the new leader of a right-wing government.
Israel’s far-right national security minister Itamar Ben-Gvir visited the scene of the attack, greeted by angry young Israelis chanting “death to terrorists.” He said he would make sure to have police set up checkpoints to inspect all Palestinians coming and going from the attacker’s neighborhood, as well as to push for legislation to impose the death penalty against convicted attackers.
“We must exact a price from terror,” he said at the scene of the first explosion. To deter terror, we must have control of Israel.
The police said that the bombs were placed at the sites during the search for the suspected attackers. The first explosion took place in the middle of rush hour traffic and police briefly closed a road leading out of the city. The initial blast left debris on the sidewalk and the wail of ambulances made for a chaotic scene. There were marks on a bus in Ramot.
“It was a crazy explosion,” Yosef Haim Gabay, a medic who was at the scene when the first blast occurred, told Israeli Army Radio. I watched people with wounds bleeding all over the place.
While Palestinians have carried out stabbings, car rammings and shootings in recent years, bombing attacks have become very rare since the end of a Palestinian uprising nearly two decades ago.
The Islamic militant Hamas, which rules the Gaza Strip and once carried out suicide bombings against Israelis, praised the perpetrators of the attacks, calling it a heroic operation, but stopped short of claiming responsibility.
Israel said that in response to the blasts, it was closing two West Bank crossings to Palestinians near the West Bank city of Jenin, a militant stronghold.
Israeli troops killed Jana Zakarneh, a Palestinian teenager who was kidnapped by armed gunmen in occupied West Bank
It was horrible. It was something that was inhumane,” Husam Ferro, the teen’s father, told Israeli news site YNet. “He was still alive and they took him in front of my eyes and I couldn’t do anything.”
The Druze leader told YNet that they were having talks about returning the body to the family. Palestinian militants have in the past carried out kidnappings to seek concessions from Israel. The militant would pay a heavy price if the body was not returned.
But later Saturday, a 13-year-old Palestinian boy opened fire elsewhere in east Jerusalem, wounding an Israeli man and his son, ages 47 and 23, paramedics said. The two people were in the hospital in a serious condition.
In 1967, Israel captured the West Bank, along with Jerusalem, and Gaza. The Palestinians want the territory for an independent state.
The Israeli military admitted Monday that its troops shot Jana Zakarneh, a 16-year-old Palestinian girl who died during a raid in the occupied West Bank on Sunday night, saying she was killed by “unintentional” Israeli fire “aimed at armed gunmen.”
She was found lying on the floor with a face full of blood, after her father went to look for her.
Speaking before the IDF admitted responsibility, Israeli Defense Minister Benny Gantz said he wanted to express “sorrow for her death, as for any death of someone who was not involved in terrorism, if that was indeed the case.”
Violence against children and the Arabs: a statement by the Palestinian Ministry of Health on Monday urging the UNICEF Secretary-General to investigate the crimes of the occupation
A general strike was declared in Jenin on Monday following Jana’s killing, WAFA said, adding that “hundreds of people” took to the streets to protest “ongoing Israeli aggression”.
In a statement on Monday, Palestinian Prime Minister Mohammad Shtayyeh called on the Special Representative of the Secretary-General of the United Nations for Children and Armed Conflict, Virginia Gamba, “to investigate the crimes of the occupation and put Israel on the blacklist.” Gamba is currently on a visit to the West Bank and Gaza.
Sixty four Palestinians have been killed by Israeli forces this year, according to the Palestinian health ministry. People clashing with Israeli forces during raids, as well as people getting shot as they attacked Israelis, are included in that number.
On Thursday, a 16-year-old boy died after he was shot by Israeli forces in Ramallah, according to a separate statement by the Palestinian Ministry of Health last week.
“Al-Rimawi, 16-years-old, was injured by two bullets from the back. The first exited from his chest and the second exited from the abdomen,” that statement said.
How I Was Born in Nablus, Israel During the War of the Second World? A Memories from a Childhood in Israel, a Journey with Israel through the Jordan Valley
As I conducted a series of focus groups with doctors, nurses, patients and medical faculty members and students, it became clear that it was impossible for me to measure the extent of the damage caused by Israel’s lockdown. The unrelenting buzzing sound of Israel’s military surveillance drones, which patrolled Nablus 24/7 for weeks, for example — many people referred to it as a form of psychological torture. How can I measure that? A public health faculty member was late to a focus group and had to go a different route because of a checkpoint blocking her way to the city. What does it say about a population’s psyche when events like these are normalized?
I have felt a responsibility to tell the truth about the situation for Palestinians in the West Bank to my family and friends, who hail from there. I was born in Nablus to a woman from a nearby village and a man from a Palestinian town that was within Israel when it was established in 1948. My father taught journalism and political science in Nablus before he moved us to the United States, where I grew up. I wanted to follow in his footsteps, so I am now a professor. I’m not a political scientist as my dad was; I’m a scholar of public health. There is a correlation between health and politics in any setting. In Nablus, I was reminded of how deep that connection is.
For most of the past 50 years, that context has remained the same, with periods of more freedom for Palestinians and periods of heavy restriction and violence. For most of my life I’ve visited family in the West Bank as a child. I remember the checkpoint lines were long and hostile Israeli soldiers were looking at our documents. I remember the electricity curfews imposed by Israel, leaving us to spend nights using only candles and lanterns. I remember when travelling to the airport in Tel Aviv, but had to switch taxis halfway through the trip because Palestinian taxis weren’t allowed to pick us up. Now I and others of Palestinian descent, regardless of citizenship or country of residence, aren’t even allowed to use that airport without special Israeli permission. We are able to travel through Jordan because Israel bombed the last Palestinian airport and won’t allow construction of a new one. A few recently have been able to fly out of the southern Israel airport.
The last night before I was scheduled to leave, Israeli military forces raided the old city of Nablus, killing five Palestinians and injuring at least a dozen more. I knew what was happening just a few minutes away.
After many calls with a taxi company, I left the city after they told me it could get me out. Unlike Palestinians forced to live under these conditions every day, my time there had an end date. Now I am left to examine and analyze my data.
New steps will be taken this week to strengthen the settlements, according to the announcement. It gave no further details.
The news cast a cloud over the planned visit next week of the U.S Secretary of State to the region and threatened to raise tensions after a bloody month in the West Bank.
The attacker’s home was to be sealed off immediately ahead of its demolition, said Netanyahu’s office. The family of attackers will lose social security benefits, as well as being easier for Israelis to get gun licenses.
Washington didn’t reply immediately. The Biden administration, which condemned the shooting, opposes settlement construction in east Jerusalem and the West Bank — lands sought by the Palestinians for a future state. The topic is likely to be high on the agenda as Blinken arrives Monday for talks with Israeli and Palestinian officials.
In addition, Netanyahu could come under pressure from members of his government, a collection of religious and ultranationalist politicians, to take even tougher action. Such steps could risk triggering more violence and potentially drag in the Hamas militant group in Gaza.
Amos Harel, a defense affairs commentator wrote that if it was possible to put this genie back into the bottle, it would need the reinforcement and proper deployment of forces.
Israel is moving to strengthen settlements after shooting attacks on friday night in east Jerusalem: The four-body incident and an Israeli TV crew identified as the shooter
Friday’s shooting, outside a synagogue in east Jerusalem on the Jewish Sabbath, left seven Israelis dead and three wounded before the gunman was killed by police. It was the deadliest attack on Israelis in 15 years.
Four of the victims’ names were published. Asher Natan and his parents, Eli and Natali, were among the others. Some victims were scheduled to be buried on Saturday night.
Mourners lit memorial candles near the synagogue on Saturday evening, and in a sign of the charged atmosphere, a crowd assaulted an Israeli TV crew that came to the area, chanting “leftists go home.”
Ella Sakovich, an aunt of Natali Mizrahi, said that her niece had been celebrating the Jewish Sabbath with her husband and his father when they heard gunfire outside on Friday night.
Natali and her husband were shot and killed while they went out of the house to treat the wounded.
In response to the shooting, Israeli police beefed up activities throughout east Jerusalem and said they had arrested 42 people, including family members, who were connected to the shooter.
Two passers-by shot and subdued a 13-year-old attacker as police rushed to the scene, police said. The police took the teen to a hospital because he had a gun.
Source: https://www.npr.org/2023/01/29/1152383010/israel-is-moving-to-strengthen-settlements-after-shooting-attacks
Israeli actions on Palestinians and Israelis in the wake of the Tel Aviv attacks on Friday night in the Jerusalem gunned down by a Palestinian
A plane is expected to land in Israel on Monday. The Biden administration condemned Friday night’s shooting and has called for calm on all sides, but given few details on how it expects to promote these goals.
Palestinians in east Jerusalem are allowed to work and move freely throughout Israel, but are not allowed to vote in national elections because they suffer from subpar public services.
The new Minister of National security, Itamar Ben-Gvir, grabbed headlines for his promises to take even stronger action against the Palestinians after he presented himself as an enforcer of law and order.
When speaking to reporters at the hospital where victims are being treated, Ben-Gvir said he wanted the shooter’s house to be sealed off immediately as a punishment and lashed out at Israel’s attorney general for taking so long.
The attorney general’s office is one of the places that Israel’s Justice System needs to be dismantled according to the new government.
The issue helped inspire weekly protests in Israel that say the proposed changes would undermine democracy and weaken the Supreme Court.
Thousands of protesters gathered in the central city of Tel Aviv for a protest on Saturday. Some people are raising banners saying that Netanyahu and Ben-Gvir are threats to world peace.
The Palestinian leadership in the West Bank, meanwhile, upheld its decision to halt security coordination with Israel to protest the deadly raid in Jenin.
After a meeting headed by President Mahmoud Abbas in Ramallah, the Palestinian Authority called on international community and the U.S. administration to force Israel to halt its raids in the West Bank.
TEL AVIV — Israeli police say at least two people were killed and several others wounded when a Palestinian rammed them with a car in Jerusalem. This comes two weeks after a spike in attacks between Palestinians and Israelis.
Police say an off-duty policeman shot and killed the driver. Israeli media identified him as Hussein Karakeh, 31, from the Palestinian neighborhood of Issawiyeh in East Jerusalem.
Israeli authorities said Wednesday’s operation had targeted three suspects “planning attacks in the immediate future.” The three were “neutralized,” the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and Israel Security Agency said in a joint statement.
The names of the two suspects released by the Israel Defence Forces were similar to the bodies of the deadreleased by the Palestinians. The IDF said one was shot while fleeing and the other two were killed in an exchange of fire with the military.
They said the last time the military conducted a daylight operation, it was because of an immediate threat.
The raid and the high death toll raised the risk of more bloodshed. The Hamas militant group warned that its patience is running out after a raid last month followed by a Palestinian attack outside a Jerusalem synagogue.
The raid in which a building was reduced to rubble and a series of shops was the bloodiest battle in the last year in the West Bank and Jerusalem. A 72-year-old man was among the 10 killed and 102 people were wounded, Palestinian officials said.
The Israeli military said it entered the city to arrest three wanted militants suspected in previous shooting attacks in the West Bank. The men were found in a hideout.
Two Palestinians Run Down the Streets in Nablus: The Case of a Bloody Hero’s Last Postage – Evidence for a Ramadan Violation
In the Old City of Nablus, people stared at the rubble that had been a large home in the centuries-old casbah. From one end to the other, shops were riddled with bullets. Cars that were parked were crushed. The cement ruins were stained with blood. There were mounds of debris and furniture from the destroyed home.
An amateur video posted online appeared to show security camera footage of two young men running down a street. One of the men had his hat off as they fell to the ground. Both bodies were still present.
The group has battled Israel to four wars since seizing control of Gaza in 2007, and Israeli officials have expressed concerns about rising tensions ahead of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, which begins in March.