The Israeli military struck the West Bank city of Jenin, authorities said Friday, the third day of heavy fighting in the Palestinian territory. The Israeli military says it “struck a terrorist cell.”
Such airstrikes, while common over the months-long Israel-Hamas war in the Gaza Strip, have been rare in the West Bank in the time since. Israel says the raids across the northern West Bank — which have killed at least 19 people, mostly militants, since late Tuesday — are aimed at preventing attacks. The Palestinians see them as a widening of the war in Gaza and an effort to perpetuate Israel’s decades-long military rule over the territory.
The Palestinian Health Ministry says at least 663 Palestinians have been killed in the West Bank since the start of the war.
In the Gaza Strip, where the Health Ministry says more than 40,000 Palestinians have been killed since the war began Oct. 7 with Hamas’ attack on Israel, an Israeli missile hit a convoy carrying medical supplies and fuel to an Emirati hospital in the Gaza Strip, killing several people from a local transportation company. Israel claimed without evidence that it opened fire after gunmen seized the convoy.
Here’s the latest:
JERUSALEM —The Israeli military said Friday it had finished a major operation in the southern Gaza cities of Khan Younis and Deir al-Balah, adding that it killed 250 militants during the operation.
Over the course of the operation, the military said it also destroyed kilometers of underground tunnels and recovered the bodies of six hostages.
The military did not say whether it was withdrawing troops from the areas and said it was “preparing for further missions.” The military’s Arabic spokesperson, Avichay Adraee, announced that Palestinians evacuated from parts of both cities would be allowed to return.
The announcement came as the war nears the 11-month mark. Israel’s offensive has killed over 40,000 Palestinians since Oct. 7, injured more than 90,000, and displaced the vast majority of the strip’s population.
JERUSALEM — Israeli forces killed three Palestinians in the north of the occupied West Bank on Friday, the third day of a large-scale operation in the territory, Palestinian health officials said.
The Israeli military said its troops identified and killed a senior leader of Hamas in Jenin, Waseem Khazem, while he was driving. When two others in the car — whom the military also identified as militants — attempted to flee, troops killed both in an airstrike.
The Palestinian Health Ministry said the three were killed in Zababdeh, a town south of Jenin city, but did not immediately confirm their identities.
Israeli forces have killed at least 19 Palestinians since the start of the operation early Wednesday, which they say is geared to root out militancy in the restive territory and prevent attacks on Israeli citizens. Hamas has claimed at least 10 of the dead as their fighters.
Since the start of the Israel-Hamas war, at least 663 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli fire in the West Bank, Palestinian health officials say, mostly in Israeli raids into Palestinian cities and towns. Attacks on Israelis in the territory have also risen.
DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza — Mourners at Al-Aqsa Hospital in the Gaza Strip gathered early Friday to hold a funeral for several members of two different families killed Thursday night after an Israeli airstrike hit their house.
A video filmed by media shows a man holding his dead child wrapped in a bloodied white shroud. Another man is seen holding an infant who was born dead that night.
More than 14,000 children have been killed since the Israel-Hamas war began on Oct. 7, according to Gaza health officials.
Several people gathered at the hospital complex and performed a funeral prayer before the bodies were taken for burial.
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — An Israeli missile hit a convoy carrying medical supplies and fuel to an Emirati hospital in the Gaza Strip, killing several people from a local transportation company, the American Near East Refugee Aid group said Friday.
Israel claimed without evidence that it opened fire after gunmen seized the convoy.
