Israel launched its largest airstrike targeting the West Bank since the start of the war, killing 18 Palestinians, including a local Hamas leader.
While the Israel Defense Forces have been locked in conflict in Gaza and Lebanon, the West Bank has seen less intense fighting, usually limited to raids and clashes with protesters. On Thursday, in a move unseen since the second intifada ended in 2005, the Israeli air force launched an airstrike with a fighter jet, targeting the city of Tulkarm.
“The IDF and ISA eliminated the head of the Hamas terrorist network in Tulkarm, alongside additional terrorists,” the IDF said in a statement posted on Telegram.
“Earlier today (Thursday), in a joint IDF and ISA counterterrorism operation, the IAF conducted an ISA intelligence-based strike in the Tulkarm area and eliminated the terrorist Zahi Yaser Abd al-Razeq Oufi, the head of the Hamas terrorist network in Tulkarm,” it continued.
The IDF blamed Oufi for an attempted car bomb attack last month, for “numerous significant and extreme terror attacks,” and for planning another “terror attack in the immediate timeframe.”
It wasn’t revealed as to whether Oufi had any connections with the recent mass shooting at a Jaffa train station that killed six Israelis. Hamas said that the shooting was carried out by members from the West Bank.
The Palestinian Health Authority, which, in contrast to Gaza, isn’t run by Hamas, said that at least 18 people were killed in Thursday’s strike, with the total expected to rise. A Palestinian security services source told AFP that the strike was the single deadliest in the West Bank since 2000. Another camp official said the airstrike had been carried out by an F-16 fighter.
The West Bank is run by Hamas’s rival, Fatah, and has a security agreement with Israel.
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas’s spokesman decried the strike in harsh terms, demanding that Israel be held accountable for the “heinous crime” and “massacre,” the Times of Israel reported. Fatah itself called for protests on Friday to honor the “heroic martyrs” killed in the strike.
Hamas likewise denounced the “cruel attack,” calling it a “dangerous escalation.”
Many disaffected Palestinians have turned to Hamas in the West Bank, which has built up militant networks to carry out attacks against the IDF and local settlers. The IDF has responded with increasing air and ground raids. Since Oct. 7, the U.N. Humanitarian Office estimates that around 695 Palestinians have been killed in the West Bank, not including those in Thursday’s strike.
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Israel has stepped up its raids to counter the threat of terrorist attacks, reportedly arresting 5,250 Palestinians across the West Bank, 2,050 of them affiliated with Hamas.
Airstrikes from warplanes have always been rare in the West Bank.