Israeli military conducts military operation in the West Bank... 1,500 residents were evicted

(Cairo = Yonhap News) Correspondent Kim Sang-hoon = As the Israeli army carried out a large-scale military operation in Hebron in the West Bank, where casualties occurred due to indiscriminate shooting by Palestinian men, about 1,500 Palestinian residents were driven out of their residences.

The Palestinian Authority (PA) defined this as collective punishment and called for immediate intervention from the international community.

According to the Palestinian state-run Wafa News Agency on the 24th (local time), the governor of Hebron announced that more than 200 families and approximately 1,500 people have already been driven out of their homes due to the Israeli military's operation that began the previous day.

Hebron Mayor Youssef al-Jabari said the Israeli military was attempting to relocate an additional 2,500 people from two areas of the city.

Hebron authorities declared a state of emergency in the city and formed a crisis management committee to support refugees, but dozens of families had to spend the night before on the streets.

This military operation was carried out a day after two Israeli soldiers were shot dead by Palestinian gunmen in Hebron.

The Israeli military reportedly demolished the building where the killed suspects lived and conducted a search operation in the nearby area to find the forces behind it.

The Israeli military declined to immediately comment on the forced displacement of Palestinians, but said the operation would last for several days, calling it a "focused and limited measure confined to areas where terrorists have been active."

Military authorities added that residents of the area can only exit through three designated exits after going through newspaper and security checks, and that if any suspicious circumstances are discovered during the check, they will be taken into custody by security forces for investigation.

The Palestinian Authority strongly opposed this.

Hussein al-Sheikh, deputy head of the local government, criticized the Israeli military's operation, calling it collective punishment.

He appealed for the international community's intervention, saying, "The entire population should not be held hostage to the policy of collective punishment, and the suffering of civilians should not be passed over without accountability."

The autonomous government's Ministry of Foreign Affairs also issued a separate statement, urging the international community to put pressure on Israel, saying, "The international community must urgently take practical and deterrent measures beyond simple condemnation to confront the threat of expanding the scope of forced displacement and destruction."