Residents of Tulkarm in the Israeli-occupied West Bank assessed the damage on Saturday from a raid by Israeli forces that has chewed up roads, brought sudden bouts of violence and left many Palestinians reeling. Israel’s military pressed on elsewhere in the territory amid signs that fighting with Palestinian militant groups could spread.
Hundreds of Israeli soldiers swept into cities in the northern West Bank this week with columns of armored vehicles and bulldozers, clashing with militants and leaving many people trapped in their homes without running water or internet. One family said that a relative with mental illness was shot dead during the raid, his body left untended for hours during the violence.
In the Nur Shams neighborhood — a focus of the raid — workers and residents cleared away dirt and rubble churned up by Israeli bulldozers searching for improvised explosive devices.
“Cars can’t move through the streets, everyone is making their way on foot, because the dirt is piled up in huge mounds,” said Suleiman Zuhairi, a resident of Nur Shams and a retired official in the Palestinian Authority.
Israeli troops largely pulled back from Tulkarm on Friday, and were continuing their operation in the flashpoint city of Jenin in the northern West Bank, while two episodes farther south prompted fears that the violence was worsening.
At least 22 Palestinians have been killed since the raid started on Wednesday, according to the Palestinian Authority’s Health Ministry, many of whom militant groups have claimed to be members. Israel says that at last 20 militants have been killed.
Late on Friday night, a Palestinian attacker was killed and three Israeli soldiers wounded after a car rigged with an explosive device blew up near a major junction between Jerusalem and Hebron, according to the Israeli authorities. The Israeli military said that another assailant was killed while trying to attack the settlement of Karmei Tzur.
Since the Hamas-led Oct. 7 attacks left about 1,200 dead in Israel, setting off the war in Gaza, Israel has feared a similar attack from the West Bank, where roughly three million Palestinians live under Israeli military occupation. The Israeli military has stepped up raids there in an attempt to head off the threat; more than 600 Palestinians have been killed in West Bank clashes with Israeli forces and civilians since October, according to the United Nations.
The current Israeli raids have targeted Palestinian militants in Jenin and Tulkarm, who the Israeli military says have attempted more than 150 attacks on Israelis over the past year. Earlier this month, Hamas and Islamic Jihad — two major Palestinian armed groups — took responsibility for an attempted bombing in Tel Aviv that moderately injured one passerby and killed the assailant.
The Israeli operation in Tulkarm focused on Nur Shams, which lies on the outskirts of the city. Historically a refugee camp for Palestinians following the 1948 war surrounding Israel’s establishment, it is now a built-up neighborhood and a Palestinian militant stronghold.
Israeli forces have swept through it multiple times since Oct. 7, often for hours on end, tearing up roads and damaging buildings. Israeli drones launched attacks from the air — once rare in the West Bank but now common — targeting militants in cars and houses.
On Friday, one family marched through the area’s streets bearing the body of Ayed Abu al-Heija, an older relative killed during the raid. He lived alone, did not work and suffered from mental illness that left him unable to care for himself without help, his family said.
Haitham Abu al-Heija, a 53-year-old nephew, said he heard a gunshot ring out Wednesday as he huddled in his house, fearing he might be caught in the crossfire. He later peered gingerly out of a window and saw his uncle lying dead, the door of his house ajar, he said.
“He couldn’t understand the danger,” he said in a phone interview.
The following day, Israeli troops raided his own house, forcing him and his family outside, he said. The rattle of gunfire and intermittent explosions terrified his children, he said, as they waited, exposed, for roughly an hour in the open.
Surrounded by soldiers, he turned to see his uncle’s body still lying in the doorway, he said. When the soldiers let them go back inside, they found a massive blast hole in one of the rooms.
“May no one ever have to go through what we did these last few days,” he said.
The Israeli military did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Ayed Abu al-Heija’s death or his family’s account of the raid on their house. Israeli military officials have said that when they raid people’s homes, they are searching for suspects, weapons or other military functions.
Mustafa Taqatqa, the Palestinian governor in Tulkarm, said the operations undermined efforts by the Palestinian Authority, which administers some West Bank areas under Israeli occupation. The raids also strengthened armed groups who argue Palestinians’ lives will only improve through violence, he added.
“The young generation is seeing their future closed in every direction,” said Mr. Taqatqa. “And so they no longer believe in peace.”
During the raid, Israeli forces successfully killed Muhammad Jaber, a militant commander in Palestinian Islamic Jihad, who had successfully evaded both Israel and the Palestinian Authority’s attempts to seize him for months. The Israeli military said he was responsible for “numerous terror attacks.”
Mr. Jaber had become a local hero for many in Nur Shams, where residents viewed him as striking a blow against the miserable status quo. On Friday, the commander’s relatives held a symbolic funeral for him, although his body is still held by Israel.
“He didn’t accept the humiliation,” said Nayez Zendiq, one of his cousins, referring to Israeli rule.
But Mr. Zuhairi, the former official, said that Palestinians living in the camp had inflated Mr. Jaber into an “icon of struggle,” giving him a reputation that exaggerated his actual activities.
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