An Israeli airstrike on the Nur Shams refugee camp in the occupied West Bank killed five Palestinians, including three teenagers.
According to Nida Ibrahim, an Tel Aviv Tribune journalist in Ramallah, West Bank, the strike took place overnight and Israeli forces reportedly targeted leaders of armed resistance groups in the camp.
Israeli attacks on the territory have exploded since the start of the war on Gaza in October.
“Medical sources tell us that they have received the bodies and body parts of five Palestinians who were killed in the Israeli airstrike on the Nur Shams refugee camp,” Ibrahim said.
“Israeli forces are seeking to target Abu Shuja’a, who was one of the leaders, if not the main leader, of the Tulkarem and Nur Shams battalions in the refugee camp, and he has survived several assassination attempts,” she added.
The Palestinian news agency Wafa identified two of the slain teenagers as Adnan Jaber, 15, and Mohammed Ahmad Elayyan, 16.
The others killed were Mohannad Qarawi, 19, Jibril Ghassan Jibril, 20, and Mohammed Ali Yusif, 49, Wafa reported.
Jibril was released as part of a deal between the Palestinian group Hamas and Israel in November that saw the release of Palestinians held in Israeli prisons for captivity in the Gaza Strip, Ibrahim reported.
Following the airstrike, Palestinian parties declared a general strike in Tulkarem governorate on Tuesday to protest the killings.
Hamas condemned the attack and called on Palestinians in the West Bank to step up their struggle against Israel’s illegal occupation.
Since the start of the Gaza war, there have been around 50 Israeli airstrikes in the West Bank – the majority of them in Tulkarem, Jenin and Nablus.
“Israeli forces have stepped up the use of airstrikes against Palestinians, saying they want to combat Palestinian fighters who use improvised explosive devices (IEDs) against Israeli vehicles and Israeli troops when attacking Palestinian villages, towns and refugee camps,” Ibrahim said.
Palestinian killed by Israeli settlers
There has also been an increase in violence in the West Bank due to attacks by Israeli settlers.
On Tuesday, settlers shot dead a Palestinian and wounded six others as they attacked Palestinian homes in the village of Wadi Rahal, near Bethlehem.
Wafa, citing the Palestinian Health Ministry, identified the killed man as Khalil Salem Khalawi.
The 40-year-old man died of his injuries after Israeli settlers attacked homes near the village’s boys’ school and opened fire on Palestinians living there, the agency said.
Hamdi Ziyada, head of the Wadi Rahal village council, told Wafa that Israeli forces attacked the village “to ensure the protection of the settlers and fired sound bombs and poison gas” at the residents.
The Israeli military and police are investigating the attack and will probe the conduct of the troops who responded, as well as that of the settlers who carried out the assault, The Times of Israel reported.
Elsewhere in the territory, a video published Tuesday by the Israeli human rights group B’Tselem shows an Israeli settler threatening to rape a Palestinian woman in the West Bank.
The video shows a group of masked settlers trying to convince a man and his wife to leave their land in the Wadi Rakhim area, south of the city of Hebron.
One of the settlers follows the Palestinian and verbally harasses him, telling him that he would like to meet him in the Israeli prison of Sde Teiman.
“Rape in the name of God, as they say. Do you understand what I mean?” the masked settler shouts at the man, referring to the sexual assaults carried out by Israeli soldiers in the prison against Palestinian detainees.
Since the beginning of the year, Israeli settlers have carried out 1,334 attacks in the West Bank and killed at least seven Palestinians, Wafa reported.
“These attacks have been increasing since the start of the war and Palestinians say the sense of impunity felt by Israeli settlers allows them to continue attacking Palestinians and their homes,” Ibrahim said.
Settlers are Israeli citizens who live illegally on private Palestinian land in the West Bank and occupied East Jerusalem. Israel began building settlements shortly after conquering the West Bank, East Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip in the June 1967 Six-Day War.
Today, more than 700,000 settlers – 10 percent of Israel’s population of nearly seven million – live in 150 settlements and 128 outposts across the West Bank and East Jerusalem.
