Israeli army attack in Jenin, four Palestinians killed

Four Palestinians, including a teenager and fighters, were killed by Israeli fire on Thursday in Jenin in the northern occupied West Bank, where the Israeli army said it had “neutralised” two suspects wanted for “terrorist activities”.

During this incursion into the so-called autonomous Palestinian territory under the Israeli–Palestinian peace accords in Oslo (1993), four Palestinians were killed, the Palestinian Ministry of Health said, identifying Omar Awadin, 16, Nidal Khazim, 28, Youssef Chiram. 29, and Louay Sagir, 37.

The armed wing of Hamas, the ruling Islamist movement in the Gaza Strip, said Youssef Chiram was one of its leaders in Jenin.

According to this hardline Palestinian organization, Nidal Khazim was a member of the al-Quds Brigades, the armed wing of Islamic Jihad.

Twenty-three injured people have also been hospitalised, the ministry said, with five of them in critical condition.

Mahmoud al-Sadi of the Palestinian Red Crescent Society in Jenin told AFP that a group of plainclothes commandos had entered the city of Jenin.

When asked by AFP, an Israeli army spokesman confirmed that the aim of the raid was to capture Charim and Khazim and claimed that the Israeli army opened fire only in response to them being fired upon.

A joint statement by the Israeli Army, Homeland Security and Border Guards said that Israeli forces “neutralised” the two men.

The Israeli-Palestinian conflict appears to have been sucked into a new convoluted spiral of violence since Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, led by one of the most right-wing governments in Israel’s history, entered office in late December.

– “The Worry Cycle” –

Stephane Dujarric, spokesman for UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, called the events in Jenin “a new example of a worrying cycle of violence” and believed it was “a new reason to step up the efforts of the international community”. This.

In the West Bank, violence has been concentrated in the northern part of the territory, a bastion of armed groups where the Israeli army has been multiplying for a year in what it bills as an “anti-terrorist operation” in the Palestinian Autonomous Territory, where Israeli preventive security accused of not fighting against Palestinian armed groups.

Armed attacks targeted at Israelis occurred in East Jerusalem, which is occupied and occupied by Israel, but also in settlements in the West Bank, as well as in Tel Aviv.

On Wednesday, the Israeli army announced that it had killed a “terrorist” two days earlier who was wearing an explosives belt and suspected of having infiltrated from Lebanon. He mentioned the possible involvement of the Lebanese Shia movement Hezbollah.

On Thursday afternoon, armed men attended the funerals of four people killed in Jenin, an AFP journalist said.

Hamas has promised that the “crimes” in Jenin “will not go unanswered” and Islamic Jihad has assured that Israel will “pay the price for these crimes”.

“These continued Israeli attacks confirm that Israel has no intention of calming the situation and stopping the explosions,” said Nabil Abu Roudeena, spokesman for the Palestinian president.

Since the beginning of the year, the Israeli–Palestinian conflict has claimed the lives of 85 Palestinians (including minors from armed groups and civilians), 12 civilians (including three minors) and an Israeli policeman, as well as a Ukrainian. According to an AFP tally compiled from official Israeli and Palestinian sources.

Palestinian Civil Affairs Minister Hussein al-Sheikh said on Thursday that a meeting on the conflict with the five countries is being held in Egypt’s Sharm el-Sheikh on Sunday.