2 Palestinians die in W.bank, Jerusalem clashes, say officials
Israeli troops shot , killed a Palestinian in the occupied West Bank, Palestinian officials said, the latest death in a surge of violence
Israeli troops shot and killed a Palestinian in the occupied West Bank on Wednesday, while a Palestinian teenager was shot dead during an operation in east Jerusalem, according to Palestinian officials.
The Palestinian Health Ministry identified deceased Palestinians as 20-year-old Aref Abdel Nasser Lahlouh and 17-year-old Mohammed Ali.
The Israeli military said the man was carrying a knife and was shot ater he atempted to atack a soldier at a military post.
Lahlouh’s death brings to 19 the number of Palestinians killed by Israeli fire this year.
Nearly 150 Palestinians were killed last year, making it the deadliest since 2004, according to figures by the Israeli rights group B’tselem.
Tensions have been high for months as Israel has been conducting nightly arrest raids in the West Bank, which were prompted by a spate of Palestinian atacks against Israelis last spring.
Some 30 people were killed in Israel by Palestinians in 2022.
Israel says most of the Palestinians killed have been militants. But others including youths protesting the incursions or people not involved in the violence have also been killed.
Earlier on Wednesday, Israeli forces demolished the home of a Palestinian gunman who allegedly killed a female Israeli soldier in an atack last year that sparked a manhunt and clampdown on the east Jerusalem neighbourhood where he lived.
The home demolition came in the first weeks of Israel’s new far-right government, which has pushed a hard line against the Palestinians and promised to ramp up setlement building in the occupied West Bank.
Police said some 300 officers and troops entered the Shuafat refugee camp to demolish the home of Uday Tamimi, who Israel said was behind the deadly shooting at a checkpoint in October.
Ater the shooting atack that killed the 19-year-old soldier, the atacker fled, sparking a weeklong manhunt and tight restrictions around Shuafat.
As part of the search, Israeli security forces choked off the camp’s entry and exit points, bringing life to a standstill for its estimated 60,000 residents.
Tamimi was eventually shot and killed ater opening fire at security guards at the entrance of Maale Adumim, a sprawling Israeli setlement in the West Bank east of Jerusalem.
Israel’s new National Security Minister Itamar Ben-gvir, an ultranationalist who oversees the police, welcomed the demolition.
“This step is very important, but not enough at all. We must destroy all terrorists’ homes and deport the terrorists themselves from the country,” he said in a statement.
Israel has carried out the demolitions of atackers’ homes well before the entry of this current government and says the tactic deters future atackers. The Palestinians and rights groups view it as collective punishment.
Israel captured the West Bank and east Jerusalem, along with the Gaza Strip, in the 1967 Mideast war. The Palestinians seek those territories for their hoped-for independent state.
Meanwhile, the UN agency for Palestinian refugees appealed Tuesday for $1.6 billion for its work in 2023, and called for Arab countries especially to show more solidarity.
UNRWA — which provides services to nearly six million Palestinians registered in the Palestinian territories, including Israeli-annexed east Jerusalem, as well as in Jordan, Lebanon and Syria — warned that “compounding challenges” had placed it under “immense strain.”
The agency, which counts nearly 30,000 staff — most of them Palestinian refugees — runs more than 700 schools that offer education to half a million children, and provides health, sanitation and social services, including food and cash assistance.
Out of the $1.6 billion requested, UNRWA said $848 million was needed for such core services.
It said another $781.6 million was needed for emergency operations.
UNRWA warned that the needs have been skyrocketing as global crises, inflation and disruptions in global supply chains have contributed to surging poverty and unemployment levels among Palestinians.