West News Wire: Since Israeli raids increased at the beginning of last year, at least nine Palestinians have been killed by Israeli forces in one of the deadliest days in the occupied West Bank.
The raid on the Jenin refugee camp on Thursday, which Palestinians have referred to as a “massacre,” resulted in 20 other people being injured with live bullets, according to the Palestinian Ministry of Health. They were all in critical condition four of them.
An elderly woman was among the fatalities, according to Palestinian authorities. The administrators of the Jenin hospital recognized her as Magda Obaid.
Following the executions, Israeli soldiers announced their withdrawal from Jenin and stated that they were checking into the woman’s death reports.
One person was killed, according to the Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigade, an armed group connected to the Palestinian political party Fatah.
According to the health ministry, another person, Saeb Azriqi, 24, succumbed to his injuries in a hospital.
It said the situation on the ground was very difficult, with injured people continuously reaching hospitals, as it accused Israeli forces of obstructing ambulances and medics.
“There is an invasion that is unprecedented in terms of how large it is and the number of injuries,” Wissam Baker, head of Jenin public hospital, told reporters.
“The ambulance driver tried to get to one of the martyrs who was on the floor, but the Israeli forces shot directly at the ambulance and prevented them from approaching him,” Baker continued.
Israeli forces also fired tear gas canisters towards the hospital, affecting the children’s division, Baker said. It caused suffocation injuries to children and others, he said.
Israel’s army denied deliberately firing tear gas at the hospital. “No one shot tear gas on purpose at a hospital,” an army spokesman said. “But the activity was not far away from the hospital and it is possible some tear gar entered through an open window.”
Palestinian Prime Minister Mohammad Shtayyeh released a statement calling on the United Nations and all international human rights organisations to “intervene urgently to provide protection for Palestinian people and stop the bloodshed of children, youth and women”.
Saleh al-Arouri, a prominent leader of the Hamas movement governing the blockaded Gaza Strip, said the “response of the resistance will not be delayed”.
“They called on the international community to hold the ‘occupation criminals’ accountable for their crimes and finally called out on the people in Gaza to go out in the streets and show their rage against the massacre committed in Jenin,” el-Sayed said.
Jenin is among areas of the northern West Bank where Israel has intensified raids over the past year, in an attempt to crack down on growing armed Palestinian resistance.
Aleef Sabbagh, a political analyst specialising in Israeli affairs, said Thursday’s operation in Jenin “should be understood as a signal it is the first shot in a coming, larger Israeli operation”.
“The lack of a response neither Arab nor international over what Israel is doing, is encouraging it to continue with its raids and killings,” Sabbagh told news reporters.
“The targeting of ambulances and hospitals, preventing aid to wounded people, the field executions even the killing of Shireen Abu Akleh there has been no accountability. If there is no real, strong response, Israel will continue to do what it wants without punishment.”
Al Jazeera’s Shireen Abu Akleh, a veteran correspondent covering the occupied Palestinian territories for more than 25 years, was shot dead in May last years while she was covering a raid on the Jenin refugee camp.
No one has yet been held accountable for her killing.
The analyst stated that while Israel defends its activities on the basis of security, the Palestinians “view that as a cynical trick aimed at humiliating the Palestinian authority.”
According to the rules of the Oslo Accord, the raid occurred in so-called Area A, which is under Palestinian administrative and law enforcement jurisdiction. It’s not like these young people in the refugee camp are going out into Israel and shooting at Israelis; they are just attempting to protect themselves, said Bishara.
At least 29 Palestinians, including five children, have already been killed by Israeli soldiers during operations in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem in January. Jenin was the home of at least 15 of those who died.
More than 170 Palestinians were killed in such raids in 2022, many of them civilians.
