A large-scale Israeli military operation swept across the occupied West Bank for a second day Thursday, killing an alleged terrorist operative and fueling calls from senior international officials to end the offensive amid fears the territory could become a “war extension from Gaza.”
The series of Israeli raids and drone strikes in the Palestinian territory are targeting “terror groups and terror cells.” Israel says.
United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres described Israel’s military operation that began in the early hours of Wednesday morning in several West Bank flashpoint cities as “dangerous developments” that are “fueling an already explosive situation.”
Josep Borrell, the European Union’s top foreign policy diplomat, said he was asking EU member states if they want to place on the sanctions list some Israeli ministers who have been launching “unacceptable hate messages against the Palestinians” and proposing actions that defy international law.
“The Israeli major military operation in the occupied West Bank must not constitute the premises of a war extension from Gaza, incl. full-scale destruction,” Borrell said in a social media post.
Janez Lenarcic, the EU’s commissioner for humanitarian aid and crisis management, said Israel’s “indiscriminate use of military force and settler violence against civilians and extensive destruction of homes and infrastructure” was “in violation of international law and human rights.”
Heartbreak during abduction:Rescued hostage talks of fellow captive dying
Developments:
∎ Senior Hamas official Izzat El-Reshiq reiterated the group’s support for the U.N. initiative for an urgent humanitarian truce.
∎ Israeli, American, Egyptian and Qatari negotiators met in Doha on Wednesday for talks on a cease-fire in Gaza.
∎ A majority of Israeli families evacuated from near the Lebanese border lack school supplies for their kids, and 20% don’t know which school their children will attend when schools start on Sunday, according to a survey funded by the International Fellowship of Christians and Jews.
Israel says it killed terrorist leader Mohammed Jaber
Mohammed Jaber, also known as Abu Shujaa, was killed following exchanges of fire during counterterrorism operations in the West Bank’s Nur Shams refugee camp outside the city of Tulkarm, the Israeli military said in a statement. Jaber was described as the head of a terrorist network in Nur Shams and was involved in carrying out numerous terrorist attacks, including a shooting attack in which an Israeli civilian, Amnon Muchtar, was murdered in June, the statement said.
“He was eliminated alongside four additional terrorists who hid inside a mosque,” the statement said. An Israeli Border Police soldier was lightly injured and was evacuated to a hospital for medical treatment.
Families of hostages make dash toward Gaza
Families of Israeli hostages being held in Gaza protested near the border on Thursday, demanding a deal to free their loved ones and at one point to cross into the embattled Palestinian enclave. The protesters carried photographs of the captives and wore shirts marked with red paint as they gathered at kibbutz Nirim in southern Israel, a little more than mile from the Gaza border. The shouted messages of love and support through a stack of speakers pointed across the border, hoping some of the hostages might be held close enough to hear.
A few dozen protesters rushed toward the border, only to be stopped by Israeli police who warned them they would be easy targets for armed militants.
“We are coming to get them back to Israel where they belong, where they are supposed to be,” said Eyal Kalderon, whose cousin Ofer is a hostage, after his failed run.
Israeli opposition leader: Netanyahu was warned about Hamas
Israeli opposition leader Yair Lapid on Thursday challenged Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s claim that he received no warnings from Israeli intelligence ahead of the deadly Hamas-led that took place on Oct. 7 and ignited the war in Gaza. Lapid said he attended a meeting six weeks before the attack at which a general warned that Iran-backed militants were strengthening and there was a “weakness” in Israeli security.
“I was informed, and the intelligence material I saw was of course also seen by the prime minister,” Lapid wrote on social media.”The prime minister − and here I am giving only a personal impression, so it can be disputed − seemed bored and indifferent to the issue, and did not comment on it.”
Netanyahu’s right-wing conservative Likud party issue a statement denying the claim.
Israel, UN at odds over polio vaccination plan
Palestinians in Gaza were hoping for a pause in fighting in the enclave to allow a polio vaccination campaign to begin Sunday. The U.N. is preparing to vaccinate an estimated 640,000 children in Gaza, where the World Health Organization confirmed on Aug. 23 that at least one baby has been paralyzed by the type 2 poliovirus, the first such case in the territory in 25 years. The World Health Organization identified the child as Abdul-Rahman Abu Al-Jidyan, who will turn 1 on Sunday.
His mother, Nivin Abu Al-Jidyan, said she feared for her son after she was told by health officials they could do little to help him.
“He is my only baby boy. It’s his right to travel and be treated; it’s his right to walk, run and move like before,” she told Reuters on Thursday from a tent in central Gaza. “It is unfair that he stays thrown in the tent without care or attention.”
Israel stepped up West Bank military operations on Wednesday
At least nine Palestinians were killed after hundreds of Israeli troops, backed by helicopters, drones and armored vehicles, conducted raids in Tulkarm, Jenin, Nablus, Tubas and other areas of the Jordan Valley. Hamas said that six of its fighters died in Jenin. Mustafa Barghouti, a onetime Palestinian presidential candidate and the current leader of the Palestinian National Initiative political grouping, said the raids may be Israel’s largest in the Palestinian territory since 2002. Barghouti accused Israel of seeking to expand its operation in Gaza to the West Bank. More than 40,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza since Oct. 7, according to the Hamas-run health ministry.
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UN court has ruled Israeli settlements are illegal
Unlike Gaza, which was administered by Hamas before the war, the West Bank is partially run by the Palestinian Authority. Israel’s military has occupied parts of the West Bank since seizing the territory from Jordan in 1967 during the Six-Day War. Since then, Israel has expanded settlements in the Palestinian territory that is now home to almost 500,000 Israelis and about 3 million Palestinians.
The United Nations’ highest court ruled last month that Israeli settlements in occupied Palestinian territories are illegal and all states should cooperate to bring an end to the Israel-Palestinian conflict.
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