The raids come amid escalating violence in the Palestinian territory.
The Israeli military launched the largest, deadliest West Bank attack of the year on Wednesday, killing at least 16 people, including a high-ranking militia commander, over the course of several days. Violence in the West Bank — perpetrated by the military, Israeli settlers, and Palestinian fighters — has been steadily accelerating over the past 10 months.
Since the October 7 Hamas raid on Israel, at least 660 Palestinians and 15 Israelis have been killed in the West Bank, according to the United Nations. It’s a smaller number than the more than 40,000 Palestinians killed in Gaza over the past 10 months, but it is still a reminder of how intense ongoing violence in the West Bank is.
The Israeli military has conducted several raids in Palestinian refugee camps since the start of the war in Gaza. The latest operation started early Wednesday morning: Air and ground forces targeted Tulkarm in the northwest, Jenin at the territory’s northern border, and Far’a refugee camp in the territory’s east. Shin Bet, an Israeli security service affiliated with the country’s intelligence groups, and the Israel Border Police were also involved in the raids, which ostensibly targeted what Israeli officials called “terrorist infrastructure.”
Israel claims Mohamed Jaber — a commander of a group affiliated with Palestinian Islamic Jihad — and Hamas commander Wassem Hazem were both killed, along with other militants during the raid. Israeli officials accused Hazem of plotting, along with other militia members, attacks within the West Bank. Like Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad helped commit the October 7 attacks; both groups also claimed responsibility for a suicide attack in Tel Aviv earlier this month, which wounded one Israeli.
“If you think about it from this sort of tactical perspective, suicide bombers are most likely to be coming from the West Bank, more so than Gaza, probably because Gaza is already a war zone,” Raphael Cohen, director of the strategy and doctrine program of RAND Project Air Force, told Vox, adding that Hamas officials have called for increased suicide attacks against Israeli territory. That may be part of what motivated Israel’s recent operation.
