Israel hit a town in the occupied West Bank with two airstrikes on Saturday in the latest use of a once-rare tactic in the densely populated area. Hamas said that three members of its military wing and six other fighters were killed in the strikes around the town of Tulkarm.
In one of the attacks, a drone strike killed five people in a vehicle, according to Palestinian media, including a local leader of the Qassam Brigades, the Hamas military wing. The Hamas statement said three of the dead belonged to Qassam, but did not claim the other six fighters as members.
The Israel military said only that it had targeted “terrorists” in the strikes on Saturday as part of an ongoing operation in Tulkarm, without identifying specific targets. It said that those in the vehicle were on their way to carry out an attack.
The military also closed roads into Tulkarm, leaving residents with no route out. Palestinian media published videos showing Israeli bulldozers tearing up stretches of road.
The Israeli military has stepped up near-daily raids on Palestinian cities and towns in the West Bank since the Oct. 7 Hamas-led attack on Israel. Israeli forces have also increasingly carried out deadly airstrikes in the territory, a rise in aerial attacks not seen since the second Palestinian uprising against Israeli occupation in the early 2000s.
Before Oct. 7, airstrikes and drone attacks on the West Bank were rare and far more limited than in Gaza. But since the war in Gaza began, Israel has stepped up its aerial attacks on Palestinian areas.
The two Palestinian territories have long been under separate governments. Hamas ruled Gaza for 17 years before war broke out there in October, while the Palestinian Authority, dominated by a rival faction to Hamas, Fatah, administers parts of the West Bank.
The Israeli military has carried out at least 39 airstrikes on Tulkarm over the past 10 months, according to the United Nations. The figure does not include Saturday’s strikes. In one of the most recent attacks on July 22, an Israeli drone strike killed five Palestinians, including two women, in Tulkarm, according to the United Nations.
At least 589 Palestinians have been killed in the West Bank by Israeli forces or Jewish settlers since Oct. 7. Some were members of Palestinian armed groups fighting the Israeli occupation, but others were civilians, according to Palestinian media and health officials. Among them were 142 children and youths under the age of 18, the Palestinian Health Ministry reported last month.
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