The Israeli military launched its biggest, deadliest attack of the year in the West Bank on Wednesday, killing at least 16 people, including a high-ranking militia commander, in days. Violence in the West Bank – perpetrated by the army, Israeli settlers and Palestinian fighters – has steadily accelerated over the past 10 months.
Hamas has attacked Israel since October 7 660 Palestinians And 15 Israelis According to the UN, the West Bank has been killed. That’s a small number compared to the 40,000 Palestinians killed in Gaza in the past 10 months, but it’s still a reminder of how intense the ongoing violence in the West Bank is.
The Israeli army has carried out several raids on Palestinian refugee camps since the start of the war in Gaza. D Last operation It began early on Wednesday: air and ground forces targeted Tulkarm in the northwest, Jenin and Fara refugee camps on the territory’s northern border. East of the land. The Shin Bet, an Israeli security service linked to the country’s intelligence groups, and the Israel Border Police were also involved in the operation, which apparently targeted what Israeli officials called a “terrorist infrastructure.”
Israel claimed that Mohammad Jaber – the commander of a group affiliated with Palestine Islamic Jihad – and Hamas commander Wasem Hazem were both killed during the operation, along with other militants. Israeli officials accused Hazem of plotting, Along with other militia members, attacks within the West Bank. Like Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad aided in the October 7 attack; Both groups have claimed responsibility A suicide attack in Tel Aviv earlier this month, which injured an Israeli.
“If you think about it from this sort of strategic perspective, the suicide bombers are probably coming from the West Bank, more than Gaza, probably because Gaza is already a war zone,” said Raphael Cohen, director of strategy and doctrine. The RAND Project Air Force program, told Vox, that Hamas officials have called for increased suicide attacks against Israeli territory. This may be part of the motivation for Israel’s recent raids.
Also an increasing number of Palestinians in the West Bank are taking up arms, usually due to anger and fear over the brutal destruction of some Gazans, but also because military operations and attacks by Jewish settlers in the West Bank are becoming increasingly violent and terroristic. Saif Aqeel, a youth leader of the Fatah political group, told the Washington Post that Jaber had been radicalized by Israel’s repeated raids on the West Bank and said, “The environment he was living in made him that way.”
As part of its operation this week, the Israeli military blocked and destroyed roads and blocked hospital entrances. According to eyewitnessesAlso electricity, water, mobile, and internet services are off. The Israeli military has denied that it has blocked access to medical facilities.
Violence has been raging in the West Bank for decades
The West Bank is east of Israel, on the west bank of the Jordan and the Dead Sea. Before 1967, Jordan controlled the region; Israel then occupied the territory and held it militarily until the 1993 Oslo Accords, when it was carved out of three “territories”, supposedly under the control of the Palestinian Authority. however, Jewish Israeli settlements in the area accelerated, and the Israeli military also moved in to protect them. Now, the Palestinian Authority, which is the nominal government, has no real control over the West Bank.
Gaza, Jerusalem and the West Bank are recognized as occupied territories under international law, and therefore Israel is obligated to protect the people living there. Israel denies it is occupying Palestinian land, but only last month International Court of Justice Ruling that Israel is occupying Palestinian land and that occupation should cease immediately.
Under the order, which is enforceable by the UN Security Council, “Israel must withdraw its forces from all parts of the occupied territories, including the Gaza Strip, and illegally remove all settlers from the West Bank, including East Jerusalem,” Erica said. Guevara Rosas, Amnesty International’s Senior Director of Research, Advocacy, Policy and Campaigns, said in a statement. Israel’s allies in the Security Council, including the United States, have given no indication that they want to enforce the court’s decision.
It has allowed Israel to continue the war in Gaza and trapped Palestinians living in the West Bank in a cycle of violence: At least five major Israeli military operations West Bank since October 7, and settler violence has also increased.
These settlers are Israeli — often armed with the country’s right-wing and often heavily armed “teeth,” according to Diana Butu, a Palestinian-Canadian lawyer specializing in international human rights law.
They have increasingly expanded the number of settlements on land the United Nations says is considered demarcated beyond Israeli control. Israel refers to them as “illegal” settlements but does not prevent people from building or from outposts. Forcing Palestinians from their homes and their lands. Some settlers started Pushing closer to town as well. Settlements are often subsidized by the Israeli government, which provides their settlements with the same high-quality infrastructure, roads, water, and schools that the government provides Palestinian villages.
There are some Palestinians took up arms against these settlersAnd authorized Israeli military operations have also encouraged vigilantes and new anti-Israel militant groups. Israel has sent more troops in response, in what seems to be an inevitable cycle.
“The cities [in the West Bank] The presence of the army is supposed to be free, but the army is carrying out these operations, that’s why [militant] Groups rose in response,” Joost Hilterman, director of the International Crisis Group’s Middle East program, told Vox. “Then the military responds to these groups and you see an increase.”
The city of Jenin and refugee camps on its outskirts — two sites that saw fighting this week — are frequent targets Because, Battu explained, they and all of Gaza are the main sites of Palestinian resistance in the occupied territories.
Overall, there are no signs that West Bank militants or Israel will change their tactics, and some of its countries — notably France and Britain — worried that escalating violence would turn the West Bank into another Gaza.
