Israel is pushing ahead with its military crackdown across the occupied West Bank, arresting dozens following a shooting that killed four Palestinians and two Israeli soldiers.
On Saturday morning, Israeli forces arrested nearly 50 Palestinians in the village of Tal, southwest of Nablus, where Friday’s shooting took place, while raiding roughly 70 homes.
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Footage posted by Quds News Network shows two blindfolded men being led away by Israeli soldiers. The arrests are part of what Israel’s military has described as an “extensive” operation launched in response to Friday’s shooting.
On Friday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defence Minister Israel Katz ordered a “wide-scale military operation” in Palestinian villages across the occupied West Bank following an attack near the illegal Havat Gilad settlement that killed two Israeli soldiers and wounded three others.
According to sources and witnesses, Israeli settlers attacked several Palestinian communities in the Nablus governorate, setting fire to Palestinian homes and other property.
The Palestinian Health Ministry says at least 87 Palestinians have been killed by Israelis in attacks across the West Bank since the beginning of the year, 21 of them by settlers, who critics say have become emboldened by the lack of international pressure on Israel to end its siege of Gaza, as well as the rhetoric of far-right ministers Itamar Ben-Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich.
Albanese calls attacks as ‘pogroms’
UN Special Rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territories Francesca Albanese on Saturday described Israeli attacks against Palestinian civilians across the occupied West Bank as “pogroms,” calling for an immediate arms embargo and a halt to trade with Israel.
“Pogroms against defenseless civilians all over the West Bank, while Gaza is under fire,” Albanese posted on X.
She accused Israeli civilians and the army of “joining forces” in the attacks, arguing that responsibility was not limited to Netanyahu or “a few rotten apples”.
“Arms embargo now — stop trade now,” Albanese said, adding that such measures are required under international law.
Israeli human rights groups have also urged the international community to take immediate action to stop state-backed settler violence in the West Bank, which has surged since Israel launched its genocidal war on Gaza in 2023.
In the West Bank, several arrests were also made in the northern city of Jenin, as well as in towns and villages across the governorate. Israeli forces raided multiple homes and deployed large numbers of troops.
Elsewhere, Israeli forces raided Tubas in the northeast and the Far’a refugee camp south of the city.
Soldiers arrived in Tubas in a large convoy of military vehicles and were deployed across several neighbourhoods, raiding homes for about three hours, the Palestinian news agency Wafa reported. They then headed to the Far’a refugee camp.
Israeli forces also raided several other locations, including the village of Far’ata, east of Qalqilya, where at least eight Palestinians were injured, according to Al Mayadeen English. The Aqbat Jabr refugee camp in Jericho and the village of Kobar in the Ramallah and el-Bireh Governorate were also among the locations targeted.
Funerals were held overnight for the four Palestinians killed in Tal on Friday.
Residents said they were forced to hold the funerals at night because Israeli authorities barred them from doing so during the day. According to reports, only a limited number of Palestinians were allowed to attend.
‘Happening all across the West Bank’
The shooting in Tal was the deadliest there in months, with both sides disputing what happened. Israelis are not permitted to enter Tal, which is under the control of the Palestinian Authority.
Footage shows rifle-wielding settlers confronting a crowd of Palestinians. Another video shows a Palestinian man seizing a gun from a settler before fatally shooting him in what appears to be self-defence. Israeli soldiers then shot and killed the Palestinian. Three other Palestinians were also killed.
Ubai Al Aboudi, a rights activist in Ramallah, told Al Jazeera that settler attacks on Palestinian villages are systemic and carried out with complete impunity, describing them as “not isolated incidents” but something “happening all across the West Bank”.
He pointed to an attack on the village of Tal on Friday, noting that it had also been targeted a week earlier on July 18.
“So-called hikers, as the Israeli officials called them, came into the village, burned a family house with the family still inside it, and it was a miracle that the residents of Tal were able to get that family out of the house before they were burned alive,” Al Aboudi said.
Human Rights Watch has also called on the Israeli government to take immediate action to prevent settlers from carrying out revenge attacks against Palestinians.
“The Israeli government didn’t prevent the settler attacks on Tal village, so now it needs to stop settler reprisals and escalating military action that will make a bad situation worse,” said Sarah Sanbar, acting Israel and Palestine researcher at Human Rights Watch.
“Years of lawlessness and impunity for attacks have turned the West Bank into a powder keg waiting to explode, and decisive action is urgently needed.”
