(Nablus) Four Palestinians were killed and nearly 20 others injured early Tuesday in raids by Israeli forces in the occupied West Bank, mainly in the city of Nablus from where a new group of local fighters operates, said the Palestinian Ministry of Health.
Posted at 7:29 p.m.
Updated at 8:28 p.m.
“There are three dead and 19 wounded, three of them seriously, by Israeli fire in Nablus,” the ministry said in a brief statement about the operation that began early Tuesday in the city, according to witnesses.
The ministry later in the night reported another Palestinian killed by Israeli fire, this time in Ramallah, the headquarters of Mahmoud Abbas’ Palestinian Authority in the central West Bank. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas is establishing “urgent contacts to put an end to this aggression against our people” in Nablus, his spokesman Nabil Abu Rudeinah said in a statement.
The Israeli army did not comment on this report, but confirmed having carried out a vast operation with the police and intelligence against the “headquarters and a workshop for the manufacture of weapons”, of the new group of Palestinian fighters called “The lion’s den” in the old town of Nablus. During this operation, “several armed suspects were shot,” the army said.
In recent weeks, a group of young Palestinian fighters-some affiliated with mainstream groups like Fatah, Hamas or Islamic Jihad and others not-have begun to carry out anti-Israeli operations from Nablus, a major city in northern occupied West Bank.
The new group baptized in Arabic “Areen al-Oussoud”, the “den of lions” in French, in tribute to Ibrahim al-Nabulsi, a young fighter nicknamed the “Lion of Nablus” and killed in early August by Israeli forces, had notably claimed responsibility for a deadly attack on an Israeli soldier two weeks ago in the occupied West Bank.
On Tuesday, the Palestinian Islamic Jihad said in a statement that its “fighters were involved in violent clashes” with Israeli forces in Nablus and threatened Israel with reprisals “for these crimes” there.
Increase in violence
In the process, the Israeli army tightened the noose on Nablus, setting up checks to identify people who left this city and constantly scanning its sky with observation drones.
During the night from Saturday to Sunday, a fighter from the “Lions’ den”, Tamer al-Kilani, was killed in the Old City of Nablus by an “explosion” attributed by his movement and the Israeli press to a bomb activated at distance by the Israeli army, which however did not comment on these assertions.
Violence has increased in recent months in the northern West Bank, Palestinian territory occupied since 1967 by the Jewish state, particularly in the areas of Nablus and Jenin, strongholds of armed groups where Israeli soldiers have stepped up operations in the wake deadly anti-Israeli attacks since March.
These raids, often interspersed with clashes with the Palestinian population, left more than a hundred dead on the Palestinian side, the heaviest toll in the West Bank for nearly seven years, according to the UN. Since the beginning of the month, 23 Palestinians and two Israeli soldiers have been killed, according to a report established by AFP.
“War crimes”
Separately, human rights organization Amnesty International on Tuesday called for an investigation by the International Criminal Court (ICC) into possible “war crimes” committed by Israel and Palestinian fighters during the escalation in the Strip. of Gaza in August.
At least 49 Palestinians, including combatants, but also civilians and children, died from August 5 to 7 in a confrontation between the Israeli army and the Islamic Jihad group in Gaza, an enclave under Israeli blockade since 2007 and politically separated and geographically from the West Bank.
The organization investigated three incidents in particular, two attributed to Israeli forces and one to Palestinian factions.
“The three deadly attacks we examined must be investigated as war crimes; all victims of unlawful attacks and their loved ones must obtain justice and reparation,” said Amnesty General Secretary Agnès Callamard on Tuesday.