Ramallah/Tel Aviv. After an attack in the West Bank with several people injured and shortly before the parliamentary elections in Israel, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has promised to seal off the Palestinian territory. Netanyahu has ordered Israel's security forces to prepare to seal off the entire West Bank later today, his office said in a statement. What is meant is that all crossings to the Palestinian territory will be closed.
After a briefing with Defense Minister Israel Katz and Chief of General Staff Ejal Zamir, among others, Netanyahu had already ordered the city of Hebron to be sealed off, it said.
The announcement followed a gun attack near Hebron in the West Bank earlier in the day. According to Israeli reports, several Israelis were injured, some critically, and the two suspected Palestinian perpetrators from Hebron were killed.
According to his office, Netanyahu said that the security forces prevented a “serious attack”. Israel's emergency services are carrying out “extensive waves of arrests”. “We will pursue Hamas terrorists and their sponsors anywhere and at any time.” It was initially unclear whether the two alleged perpetrators were members of Hamas.
According to his office, Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also said in the afternoon at the scene of the incident that the military would now enter the districts of the city from which the perpetrators came, search houses there and destroy "terrorist infrastructure". Residents therefore have to leave the areas.
The Israeli head of government cited the military's largest offensive in years against militant Palestinians in several refugee neighborhoods in the northern West Bank as a model. At the beginning of last year, numerous people were killed and tens of thousands were displaced. There was also massive destruction in the neighborhoods. The United Nations and the European Union criticized the operation. Before the offensive, there had been repeated attacks on Israelis in the West Bank.
Israel conquered, among other things, the West Bank and East Jerusalem in the Six-Day War in 1967 and has occupied this area ever since. Today, around 700,000 Israeli settlers live there among three million Palestinians.
The situation in the occupied West Bank has worsened again since the Hamas massacre in Israel on October 7, 2023 and the Gaza war it triggered. According to the Palestinian Ministry of Health, more than 1,100 Palestinians have since been killed in Israeli military operations, armed clashes and attacks in the West Bank.
But violence by radical Israeli settlers against Palestinians has also increased sharply. The Israeli military is repeatedly accused of not taking decisive action against such attacks or even cooperating with the settlers. Observers are already warning of a new Palestinian uprising as a result of settler violence.
A lockdown of the West Bank before the election would not be unusual. Israel also often seals off the area during high Jewish holidays in order to, according to its own statements, prevent attacks - most recently at the end of September during the week-long Feast of Tabernacles (Sukkot).
If the crossings are closed, most Palestinians will no longer be able to enter Israel for medical treatment, to visit Jerusalem's Temple Mount (Al-Haram al-Sharif) with the Dome of the Rock and the Al-Aqsa Mosque, or to visit relatives. You generally need prior approval for this. Palestinians residing in Arab-dominated East Jerusalem should not be affected by the possible closure of the crossings and should still be able to pass through them, it was heard on site.
The people of Israel are to elect a new parliament in four days. The conflict with the Palestinians is an important election campaign issue. Right-wing politicians are trying to score points with their voters by promising tough action against Palestinian violence. However, they hardly address the increasing attacks by radical Israeli settlers on Palestinians in the West Bank.
