At least nine Palestinians have been killed in a widespread offensive in the Israeli-occupied northern West Bank, targeting the provinces of Tulkarem, Jenin and Tubas.
According to the Palestinian Red Crescent, Israeli forces killed four people at the Fara’a refugee camp in Tubas, three people were killed in an Israeli drone strike in the village of Seir near Jenin, and two people were killed in Jenin.
Jenin, a city of about 39,000 people, is said to be completely sealed off by the Israeli army. Jenin Governor Kamal Abu al-Rubb said Israeli troops had blocked access to Jenin’s hospital and other medical facilities, while Israeli media reported that Israeli troops had surrounded hospitals in Tulkarem and Tubas.
The Israeli military described the attack, which began early Wednesday morning, as the largest in the West Bank in two decades, and issued a joint statement with Israel Police describing it as a “counter-terrorism operation” targeting Palestinian fighters.
Let’s take a closer look.
How often do Israeli forces attack Palestinians in the occupied West Bank?
Israel has been carrying out almost daily attacks in the West Bank since 2022, and this has been happening since before the current far-right Israeli government.
They attacked Palestinian cities, refugee camps and villages, killing hundreds.
Since 2022, Israeli airstrikes and attacks by Israeli settlers have killed about 1,000 Palestinians in the West Bank.
The military strikes stem from Israel’s policy of using force to deal with the West Bank, which it has illegally occupied since 1967, rather than agreeing to a Palestinian state. The focus is usually on preventing Palestinian resistance forces from becoming strong enough to challenge Israel.
Palestinian militants in the West Bank are not as powerful as those in Gaza, and Israel has long sought to maintain that power, including through cooperation with the Palestinian Authority (PA) on security issues, a practice that makes the PA unpopular among Palestinians.
Israelis living in illegal settlements regularly harass, violently attack, and sometimes force Palestinians, especially those living in villages and rural areas, to leave their land.
Since the start of Israel’s war in the Gaza Strip on October 7, Israeli airstrikes and attacks on settlers have increased in frequency and violence.
How unprecedented is Wednesday’s military operation?
Israel’s operation in three West Bank provinces, involving hundreds of soldiers, fighter jets, drones and bulldozers, is clearly a large-scale military operation.
Israeli media, citing Israeli military sources, reported that the attacks are expected to continue for several days and that the death toll is expected to rise sharply, especially since many Palestinian civilians live in the cities and towns under attack.
Israel described the attack as the largest in the West Bank since the Second Intifada in the Palestinian territories in 2002.
At the time, Israel was criticized for its harsh response to initial reactions including non-violent protests, civil disobedience and stone-throwing.
By the end of the Intifada in 2005, Israel had killed 4,793 Palestinians. Israeli casualties were estimated at around 1,000.
How connected is Israel’s West Bank attack to the Gaza war?
Israel has long waged military operations in the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip, and along with Lebanon’s Hezbollah, has portrayed the campaign as a battleground in the conflict between the Palestinians and Israel’s main regional geopolitical adversary, Iran.
Israel views groups such as Hamas, Hezbollah and many other Palestinian movements as proxies of Iran.
Israeli Foreign Minister Yisrael Katz said on social media after the attacks began in the northern West Bank that Iran was “working to establish an eastern terror front” against Israel in the West Bank by “funding and arming terrorists and smuggling sophisticated weapons out of Jordan.”
But as noted earlier, Israel’s massive attacks on the West Bank began long before October 7, and have become particularly intense since Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu took office in late 2022 with the support of openly anti-Palestinian figures, taking up key ministerial posts.
The first time helicopters were used in attacks in the West Bank was before October 7, specifically during a two-day airstrike on the Jenin refugee camp in July 2023. At that time, Israel said it carried out 15 airstrikes using helicopters and reconnaissance drones.
What Does Israel Want in the West Bank?
Although technically under the control of the Palestinian Authority in Ramallah, most of the West Bank is policed and governed by Israel, and Israeli troops can enter any part of occupied Palestinian territory.
Israeli soldiers are permanently stationed throughout the West Bank, illegal Israeli settlements and Israeli-only roads crisscross the area, and the prospect of a Palestinian state is remote. The International Court of Justice recently declared Israel’s continued presence in the occupied West Bank and occupied East Jerusalem “illegal.”
Israel often frames its occupation of the West Bank as a security necessity, but Netanyahu and other leading Israeli politicians have rejected a two-state solution, publicly called for the growth of illegal Israeli settlements, and stressed the centrality of the territory, which Israel calls “Judea and Samaria,” to Israel.
Moreover, responsibility for construction control and policing in the West Bank is overseen by two of Israel’s most controversial and pro-settler government ministers.
Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich recently assumed overall control over construction in the West Bank, while National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir was in charge of police affairs. Both have supported further Israeli expansion into the Palestinian territories, and both have been repeatedly accused of supporting settler violence against Palestinian civilians in the territories. Smotrich and Ben-Gvir are both settlers.
And now, as attacks continue in the West Bank, Foreign Minister Katz has called for a “temporary evacuation” of Palestinians from the West Bank, raising concerns that Israel is trying to force Palestinians out of the area.
According to Middle East political analyst Omar Badar, this is part of a broader Israeli strategy.
“I think the context is worth noting, which is that Israel has been trying to annex and ethnically cleanse vast swathes of the West Bank for a very, very long time,” Badar told Al Jazeera.
