A recently formed armed group based in the Old City of Nablus called the Lion’s Den,which has surged in prominence over the past months,confirmed the militants were its members.
During the raid,the military said armed men in the city “shot heavily towards the forces,” which responded with live fire. It said others hurled rocks and explosives at the troops. The military released a video taken from inside an armoured vehicle as crowds of Palestinian youths pelt it with stones. There were no Israeli casualties.
Demonstrator burns tires during a protest against the Israeli military raid.Credit:AP
Time-stamped security footage widely shared online appeared to show two unarmed young men running down a street. Gunshots are heard,and both fall to the ground,with one’s hat flying off his head. Both bodies remained still.
Hecht called the video “problematic”,and said the military was looking into it.
In the Old City of Nablus,people stared at the rubble that had been the large home in the centuries-old marketplace. From one end to the other,shops were riddled with bullets. Parked cars were crushed. Blood stained the cement ruins. Furniture from the destroyed home was scattered among mounds of debris.
The Palestinian Health Ministry said 102 people were wounded,and six of them were in critical condition. Various Palestinian militant groups claimed six of the dead — including the three from Lion’s Den targeted in the raid — as members. But two men,ages 72 and 61,were also killed. There was no immediate word on whether the others belonged to armed groups.
Palestinians carry the body of man who was killed in the clashes.Credit:AP
Last month,Israeli troops killed 10 people in a similar raid in the northern West Bank. The following day,a lone Palestinian gunman opened fire near a synagogue in an east Jerusalem settlement,killing seven people.
Days later,five Palestinian militants were killed in an Israeli arrest raid elsewhere in the West Bank. That was followed by a Palestinian car ramming that killed three Israelis,including two young brothers,in Jerusalem.
The fighting comes at a sensitive time,less than two months after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s new hard-line government took office. The government is dominated by ultra-nationalists who have pushed for tougher action against Palestinian militants. Israeli media have quoted top security officials as expressing concern that this could lead to even more violence.
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Israeli police announced they were beefing up forces and going on heightened alert in the West Bank and east Jerusalem.
The cabinet includes a number of West Bank settler leaders,one of whom has been promised authority over settlement construction.
Yesha,the settlement council,announced that Israeli planning officials had granted approval to nearly 2,000 new homes in settlements across the West Bank. The defence body that grants the approvals,the Civil Administration,said the meeting was still underway on Wednesday and that an announcement would only be issued on Thursday,after the two-day session is over.
The Palestinians and most of the international community say settlements built on occupied lands are illegal and obstacles to peace. Over 700,000 settlers now live in the West Bank and east Jerusalem,territories captured by Israel in 1967 and sought by the Palestinians for a future state.
The Israeli decision comes in the wake of the UN presidential statement that strongly criticised settlements. The US blocked what would have been a legally binding council resolution.
American diplomats claimed to have extracted an Israeli pledge to halt unilateral action in order to block the resolution. The approval of new settlements by Israel would appear to defy that claim.
In the Gaza Strip,a spokesman for the ruling Hamas militant group issued a veiled threat following the Nablus raid.
“The resistance in Gaza is observing the enemy’s escalating crimes against our people in the occupied West Bank,and its patience is running out,” said Abu Obeida,a spokesman for the group.
Late Wednesday,Palestinian activists burned tires along Gaza’s frontier with Israel in protest.
Hamas has battled Israel in 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 the second half of March.
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.
Israel says that most of those killed have been militants but others — including youths protesting the incursions and other people not involved in confrontations — have also been killed. An AP tally has found that just under half of those killed belonged to militant groups.
Israel says the military raids are meant to dismantle militant networks and thwart future attacks while the Palestinians view them as further entrenchment of Israel’s open-ended,55-year occupation.
Israel captured the West Bank,east Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip in the 1967 Middle East war,territories the Palestinians seek for their hoped-for independent state.
AP
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