Israeli forces kill at least 10 in major operation in West Bank

Israeli forces launched a large operation in the occupied West Bank overnight and into Wednesday, killing at least 10 Hamas militants and sealing off the city of Jenin.

The ongoing operation was among the largest in the West Bank in months, and a reminder that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict extends far beyond the war in Gaza that began with Hamas's Oct. 7 attack. Israel says it is rooting out West Bank militants to prevent attacks, while Palestinians fear it intends to broaden the war and expel them from territories they want for a future state.

Lt.-Col. Nadav Shoshani, an Israeli military spokesperson, said "large forces" had entered Jenin, which has long been a militant stronghold, as well as Tulkarem and the Al-Faraa refugee camp, all in the northern West Bank.

He said Israeli forces killed three militants in an airstrike in Tulkarem and four in an airstrike in Al-Faraa. He said another five suspected militants were arrested, and that the raids were the first stage of an even larger operation. Four Palestinians were killed by Israeli fire in Jenin, according to Palestinian officials.

Hamas said 10 of its fighters had been killed in the West Bank on Wednesday, including three of the four men killed in Jenin. It was not immediately clear if the fourth was also a fighter. The military said all of the dead were militants.

Nabil Abu Rudeineh, a spokesperson for Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, condemned the raids as a "serious escalation" and called on the United States to intervene. 

The Palestinian Health Ministry said the bodies of seven people were brought to the hospital in Tubas, another West Bank city, and another two were brought to the hospital in Jenin. The ministry identified two killed in Jenin as Qassam Jabarin, 25, and Asem Balout, 39. Hamas claimed Jabarin as a fighter and said another two fighters, Mohammed Abu Zumeiro and Ahmed al-Sous, were killed in Jenin.

At least 652 Palestinians in the West Bank have been killed by Israeli fire since the war in Gaza began over 10 months ago, according to Palestinian health officials. Most have died during raids by Israeli forces.

Access blocked to hospitals

The governor of Jenin, Kamal Abu al-Rub, said on Palestinian radio that Israeli forces had surrounded the city, blocking exit and entry points and ripping up infrastructure in the camp. Palestinian militant groups said they were exchanging fire with the Israeli military.

The Palestinian Health Ministry in the West Bank said Israeli forces had blocked the roads leading to a hospital with dirt barriers and surrounded other medical facilities in Jenin. Shoshani said the military was trying to prevent militants from taking shelter in hospitals.

An Associated Press reporter saw army vehicles blocking all the entrances to the Al-Faraa camp. Military jeeps and bulldozers entered the camp and soldiers could be seen patrolling its alleyways by foot. Water leaked onto the damaged streets from houses where fighting had damaged tanks and pipes. Shots rang out every few minutes.

The raids follow an attack on Monday, in which an Israeli airstrike killed five Palestinians in the northern West Bank, according to Palestinian health officials. The Israeli military said that it struck an "operations room" used by militants in the Nur Shams refugee camp in the city of Tulkarem. Palestinian health officials said five bodies arrived at a nearby hospital.

Israeli official compares West Bank to Gaza

Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz drew comparisons with Gaza and called for similar measures to be applied in the West Bank, including a suggestion that Palestinians could be forced out of their homes. 

"We must deal with the threat just as we deal with the terrorist infrastructure in Gaza, including the temporary evacuation of Palestinian residents and whatever steps might be required. This is a war in every respect, and we must win it," he wrote on the platform X.

Shoshani said there was no plan to evacuate civilians.

Hamas called on Palestinians in the West Bank to rise up, saying the raids are part of a larger plan to expand the war in Gaza and blaming the escalation on U.S. support for Israel. The militant group called on security forces loyal to the Western-backed Palestinian Authority to "join the sacred battle of our people."

The war in Gaza erupted on Oct. 7, when Hamas-led militants stormed into southern Israel. Israeli authorities said some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, were killed in the attack, and around 250 were taken hostage. The militants are still holding 108 hostages, after most of the rest were released during a November ceasefire.

Israel's retaliatory offensive has killed over 40,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza's Health Ministry. Around 90 per cent of Gaza's population has been displaced, often multiple times, and Israeli bombardment and ground operations have caused vast destruction.

Israeli strikes in Gaza overnight and into Wednesday killed at least 24 people, including five women and five children, according to Palestinian health officials. Associated Press reporters at two hospitals confirmed the toll.

One strike hit a cluster of tents housing displaced people near the central town of Deir al-Balah, killing eight including two brothers, aged six and 17. 

"He's alive!" their mother shouted as the teenager's body was carried to the morgue. She later sobbed and cradled both of them. Israel says it only targets militants and tries to avoid harming civilians, but Palestinians say nowhere in Gaza is safe more than 10 months into the war.

Israel captured the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem in the 1967 Mideast war. The Palestinians want all three for a future state. 

Over 500,000 Jewish settlers live in settlements across the territory that most of the international community, including Canada, considers illegal. They have Israeli citizenship, while the three million Palestinians in the West Bank live under Israeli military rule, with the Palestinian Authority exercising limited control over population centres.

Settler violence continues

Settler violence has surged in the West Bank since the beginning of the war. A Palestinian was fatally shot and three were wounded earlier this week in the West Bank after Jewish settlers rampaged through a town, Palestinian health officials said. 

Hamdi Ziyada, head of the local council in Wadi Rahal, said settlers entered the village near Bethlehem late Monday and hurled rocks at homes and cars. He said one of the settlers fired live rounds.

The Israeli military said Palestinians had thrown rocks at Israeli civilians in the area, and that its forces opened fire to disperse clashes between Israelis and Palestinians. The reported fatality is being investigated, the military said. 

On Wednesday, the Biden administration imposed sanctions on a West Bank Jewish settler group and the security chief of another group in the latest push to target Israeli organizations and people responsible for violence against Palestinian civilians.

The U.S. State Department announced the same day that it had imposed sanctions on Hashomer Yosh, an Israeli non-governmental organization that supports a previously designated settler outpost known as Meitarim Farm and several of its leaders. The department also imposed sanctions on Yitzhak Levi Filant, the security co-ordinator for Yitzhar settlement.

Ongoing ceasefire talks to pause the war are shifting to the Qatari capital of Doha after several days of intense negotiations in Cairo that have failed to find a resolution.