Children among 33 Palestinians killed in ongoing Israeli West Bank raids

AFP , Wednesday 4 Sep 2024

Israeli occupation forces were conducting raids in the northern West Bank on Tuesday, a week into Israel's large-scale army aggression in the occupied territory that has killed at least 33 people, including children, and wounded 130 others.

Tulkarem
Israeli armoured vehicles drive on a destroyed street during a raid in Tulkarem on September 3, 2024, amid a large-scale military assault launched a week earlier in the occupied West Bank. AFP

 

In the latest bloodshed, two Palestinian men were killed in "Israeli aggression on the Dhnaba suburb, east of Tulkarem", the Health ministry said in a statement.

In separate violence on Tuesday, the Israeli army killed a 16-year-old girl in the town of Kfar Dan, in Jenin governorate, the ministry said.

An Israeli air strike overnight in Tulkarem killed a 15-year-old Palestinian, said a hospital source in the city.

In all, there had been "33 martyrs and about 130 wounded in the West Bank since Wednesday" when the Israeli occupation army launched a series of coordinated raids, a ministry statement said.

Nineteen have been killed in Jenin governorate, seven in Tulkarem and four in Tubas, it said.

The death toll of 33 given by the ministry includes three Palestinians killed by Israeli forces in the Hebron area in the southern West Bank, in attacks unrelated to the raids in the north.

Empty streets
 

An AFP correspondent reported that Jenin was largely deserted on Tuesday, with streets empty, shops closed, and only Israeli armoured vehicles, bulldozers, and ambulances present.

The correspondent also noted significant damage, with paved streets torn up by Israeli bulldozers in several areas.

The Jenin city council stated that 70 percent of the city’s roads and streets have been destroyed since the raid began.

Bashir Matahen, a municipality spokesman, said about 20 kilometres of water, sewage, communications and electricity lines were destroyed, including 80 percent of the city's water pipes.

The municipality lacked the funds to carry out all the necessary repairs, he told AFP.

Jenin and its adjacent refugee camp -- where army bulldozers destroyed infrastructure -- have long been a bastion of Palestinian resistance against Israel, which has occupied the West Bank since 1967.

The occupation army carries out regular incursions into Palestinian population centres, but such operations are rarely conducted simultaneously as in the northern West Bank in recent days.

In Tulkarem, near Jenin, the Israeli army said on Monday night that its aircraft struck a Palestinian resistance cell that shot at security forces during an Israeli raid of the city.

Surging violence
 

A medical source at the Tulkarem government hospital told AFP on Tuesday that a 15-year-old teenager was killed in the strike that also wounded his father and four others.

The Palestinian Red Crescent said its teams handled several shrapnel injuries in Tulkarem, including one of its paramedics.

On Tuesday, Israeli army vehicles including bulldozers were seen on the streets of Tulkarem, where roads have also been damaged or destroyed, said an AFP journalist.

One man, holding a Palestinian flag, was standing defiantly in front of the bulldozers.

Violence against Palestinians has surged since the Israeli war on Gaza erupted, which is separated from the West Bank by Israeli territory.

Israeli troops or settlers have killed at least 637 Palestinians in the West Bank since the start of the Gaza war, according to the UN figures from last week.

At least 23 Israelis, mostly soldiers and police officers, have been killed in Palestinian resistance attacks during the same period, according to Israeli officials.

*This story was edited by Ahram Online.

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