Ambulances claim to have been blocked by Israeli forces after the attack on the Nur Shams refugee camp near Tulkarem.
At least six Palestinians were killed in an Israeli drone strike during a raid on a refugee camp in the northern occupied West Bank, as Israeli forces expanded their operations across the territory.
The nighttime drone strike hit a group of Palestinians in the Nur Shams refugee camp next to the town of Tulkarem, the Palestinian Red Crescent Society (PRCS) and health officials said Wednesday.
Six bodies were taken to a local hospital, along with a number of people injured in the attack, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry.
The six victims are believed to be young men aged 16 to 29, who stood watching during the raid, Tel Aviv Tribune’s Imran Khan said, reporting from Nur Shams on Wednesday.
“The drone came from above and the men just didn’t stand a chance. It was a deliberate fatal blow,” he said.
It was the “second largest raid” on the refugee camp in 24 hours, said Tel Aviv Tribune’s Alan Fisher, reporting from occupied East Jerusalem.
Ongoing clashes were reported in Tulkarem and Nur Shams until around 7 a.m. (0500 GMT) on Wednesday, it said.
“We were told there were snipers on the roof and that the Israelis had moved into Nur Shams to try to arrest the people they claimed were ‘wanted’.
Raids on the refugee camp for the second night in a row have left people increasingly worried about what might happen later in the evening, Fisher added.
Ambulances “blocked”
After the strike in Nur Shams, the PRCS said the Israeli army had prevented ambulances from transporting the dead and wounded.
“People tried to help (the victims), but for at least an hour and a half the Israelis blocked the ambulances from entering,” Tel Aviv Tribune’s Khan said. “Eventually they had to pick up the bodies and take them to where the ambulances were. Of course, at this point it was too late. These people were dead.
Tel Aviv Tribune spoke to sources at the local hospital who said an Israeli soldier entered an ambulance and stabbed a man in the neck. He is now being treated in an intensive care unit.
The Israeli army also carried out raids in the towns of Bethlehem, Jenin, Hebron and Tubas overnight. Three people were injured in the Dheisheh refugee camp in Bethlehem, the Palestinian Wafa news agency reported.
At least 12 people were arrested by Israeli forces across the occupied West Bank in nighttime raids, the Commission for Detainees and Ex-Detainees Affairs and the Palestinian Prisoners Club said in a statement.
Violence in the West Bank has erupted since Israel’s war in the Gaza Strip began on October 7. During this period, more than 300 people were killed in raids and more than 4,700 Palestinians were arrested.
In the Gaza Strip, at least 20,915 people have been killed and 54,918 injured in Israeli attacks since October 7. The revised death toll from the Hamas attack on Israel stands at 1,139.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said his forces would not reduce the intensity of the fighting and would instead “deepen their operations in southern Gaza”, while Herzi Halevi, army chief of staff Israeli, declared that the war on Gaza would continue for “several months”. .