JERUSALEM, Oct 24 (Reuters) – The Israeli army forced about 1,200 Palestinians to leave their homes in Hebron, in the occupied West Bank, according to a Palestinian authority on Saturday, one day after a Palestinian attack killed two Israeli soldiers.
The Prime Minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu, had announced on Friday that the military would launch a large-scale operation after the soldiers were killed, when two armed Palestinian men opened fire at a military checkpoint near the city. The Israeli army said the shooters were killed.
The military also said that the operation in the Al-Jaladah and Ein Deir Baha neighborhoods, near the checkpoint at the entrance to Hebron, was aimed at locating militants and weapons. In a statement, they said they would also carry out demolitions.
The Palestinian Authority criticized the operation, calling it a “collective punishment”.
Yousef Zouhair Al-Jabari, head of the Hebron municipality, said that about 1,300 people were at risk of losing their homes, in addition to the 1,200 already displaced.
He also stated that the Israeli operations were motivated by the Tuesday parliamentary elections, in which Netanyahu’s right-wing coalition could lose its majority, according to opinion polls.
“Netanyahu and the radical ministers in his government are trying to win as many votes as possible from the settlers,” Al-Jabari said.
The non-governmental organization Palestinian Prisoners Club said Israeli forces detained about 70 Palestinians on Friday and Saturday. Israeli authorities did not comment on the alleged detentions.
Settlements
Al-Jabari said that the troops demolished shops, factories, homes, and roads in Hebron and that the response was disproportionate and unjustified.
Residents of Hebron told Reuters that the troops expelled many people with no connection to the authors of the Palestinian attack.
“We are asking the authorities to support us because we have no involvement in this. There are children. We are isolated; we do nothing. All of this is arbitrary,” said Majdi Nasser, one of the residents removed from his home.
Residents told Reuters they had seen Israeli soldiers marking houses with a black “X” after their Palestinian occupants had been forced to leave. The meaning of the marking was not immediately clear.
The Netanyahu government has overseen a rapid expansion of settlements in the West Bank, regarded as illegal by UN bodies and by the majority of countries, though Israel disputes that assessment.
Across the West Bank, Israel blocked the entrances to most Palestinian cities and villages, severely restricting Palestinians’ freedom of movement.
Yousef Mur, a resident of the Palestinian city of Yatta, said the blockades prevented him from reaching Jerusalem with his daughter for cancer treatment.
“The situation is bad and we are suffering. When we try to cross, they threw tear gas grenades in our direction, and my daughter was frightened along the way. They threw tear gas grenades at people. The situation is very difficult,” Mur said.
(Reporting by Pesha Magid and Mussa Qawasma)
