Israeli army kills two Palestinians in West Bank confrontation

Israeli forces have killed two Palestinians, including a man claimed by an armed group as a member, during a confrontation after troops entered a village in the occupied West Bank, Palestinian health officials said.

The two men were killed in the Palestinian village of Kafr Dan near the northern city of Jenin.

The Israeli military said it entered Kafr Dan late on Sunday to demolish the houses of two Palestinian gunmen who killed an Israeli soldier in September.

The Palestinian Health Ministry identified those killed as Samer Houshiyeh, 21, and Fouad Abed, 25.

Mr Houshiyeh was shot several times in the chest, according to Samer Attiyeh, the director of the Ibn Sina Hosipital in Jenin. An armed group, the Al Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades, later claimed Houshiyeh as a member.

The group, an offshoot of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’s Fatah party, published an older photo in which Mr Houshiyeh posed with rifles. Video on social media showed his body wrapped with the armed group’s flag as his mother and other mourners bid farewell.

It was not immediately clear whether the second Palestinian killed was also affiliated with a militant group.

Israel says it demolishes the homes of militants as a way to deter potential attackers. Critics say the tactic amounts to collective punishment.

The military has been conducting near-daily raids into Palestinian cities and towns since a spate of attacks against Israelis killed 19 last spring, and Israeli rights group B’Tselem said 2022 was the deadliest year for Palestinians since 2004, a period of intense violence that came during a Palestinian uprising.

Nearly 150 Palestinians were killed by Israeli fire in the West Bank and east Jerusalem last year, according to B’Tselem, making it the worst year since 2004 when 197 were killed.

The Israeli army says most of the Palestinians killed have been militants, but stone-throwing youths protesting against the incursions and others not involved in confrontations have also been killed.

Israel says the raids are meant to dismantle militant networks and thwart future attacks. The Palestinians see them as further entrenchment of Israel’s 55-year occupation of the West Bank.

Israel captured the West Bank, along with east Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip, in the 1967 Middle East war and the Palestinians seek those territories for a future state.