West Bank escalation signals potential for a multifront regional conflict

Demonstrators sit before Israeli border guards during a protest vigil in Beit Jala in the occupied West Bank on September 3, 2024 in solidarity with the Palestinian Kisiya family whose land was taken over by armed Israeli settlers planning to build a new outpost. (AFP)
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Updated 09 September 2024
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West Bank escalation signals potential for a multifront regional conflict

  • Deadly Israeli military operations and Jewish settler attacks drive unrest in an already volatile occupied territory
  • Violence shows no sign of ebbing despite elimination of several militant commanders by Israeli security forces

DUBAI: Israeli military raids, settler attacks and a vicious cycle of violence have claimed the lives of more than 662 Palestinians and 24 Israelis in the West Bank since Oct. 7, raising the specter of a new active front in a regional conflict.

The West Bank has long been a center of unrest, but recent events have led to unprecedented volatility, with the Israeli government stepping up military operations in the area, including large-scale raids by soldiers backed by armored vehicles and bulldozers in Jenin, Tulkarm and other areas.

One recent raid at a refugee camp in the city of Jenin, which houses more than 4,000 Palestinians, involved hundreds of Israeli troops and armored vehicles. Simultaneous raids were launched in Tulkarm, Tubas, Nablus and Ramallah.

The Israeli army withdrew from Jenin and the refugee camp on Friday after the 10-day operation, which left 36 dead across the occupied West Bank, witnesses said. Residents who had fled began returning to their homes in the camp.

Israeli officials said 14 militants were killed and at least 25 arrested over the course of the Jenin assault, which camp residents say has led to the blockage of essential aid. One Israeli soldier was killed in the operation.




Bulldozers tear up a street during an Israeli raid in the center of Jenin in the occupied West Bank on September 2, 2024. (AFP)

Hamas, whose Oct. 7 attack on southern Israel triggered the ongoing war in Gaza, and Palestinian Islamic Jihad have acknowledged the loss of at least 14 fighters. Since Oct. 7, Israeli troops have arrested some 5,000 Palestinians across the West Bank.

“Operation Summer Camps” was the largest incursion since the early 2000s, when the Second Intifada, or uprising, took place. Authorities said the raids are part of a strategy to prevent Iranian-backed militant groups from launching attacks on Israeli citizens.

Yoav Gallant, the Israeli defense minister, described the roundup of terrorist suspects as “mowing the lawn” but said the threat to Israel would only be fully neutralized once its forces “pull out the roots.”




Israeli military vehicles deploy during a house demolition operation in the Palestinian village of Kafr Dan, west of Jenin in the occupied West Bank, on Sept. 3, 2024. (AFP)

“The rise of terror in Judea and Samaria is an issue that we need to be focused on every minute,” Gallant said during a meeting with military officials, describing the West Bank by its biblical name.

Videos of the raids shared on social media show deserted streets and colossal damage to buildings. The UN Human Rights Office has accused Israeli forces of using “unlawful force” and called for an “immediate end” to the operation.

Kamal Abu Al-Rub, the governor of Jenin, said the situation was the “most severe, the most painful and oppressive” in years. He said Israeli troops had mounted 12 major raids in the city since Oct. 7.

 

 

Medecins Sans Frontieres, one of the aid agencies operating in the West Bank, said that “repeated attacks by the Israeli military on health workers, ambulances and medical facilities, are severely hindering people’s ability to get access to medical care. There has been very limited medical access in the city of Tulkarm and its refugee camps.”

The organization said its teams had ceased operations in Jenin and Tulkarm, citing restrictions to their movements.

Ori Goldberg, a lecturer at Israel’s Reichman University, regards Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s actions in the West Bank as an act of desperation designed to rally public support amid mass protests over his handling of the Gaza hostage crisis.

INNUMBERS

• 650 Palestinians killed in West Bank and East Jerusalem since Oct. 7 (Palestinian Ministry of Health).

• 1,300 Attacks by Israeli settlers against Palestinians in Oct. 7, 2023-Sept. 2, 2024 period

Source: UN OCHA

The strategy could be backfiring, however, as the Israeli occupation of the West Bank appears to be “teetering” on the brink of all-out chaos.

“Israeli citizens support the war on terror,” Goldberg told Arab News, referring to the West Bank raids, but “they don’t see the connection between the dead hostages and the Israeli rampage. They think we have to do this. But I don’t think Israel can contain the violence.”

The military operation inside the Jenin refugee camp has left many Palestinian homes damaged or destroyed by army bulldozers and pavement stripped from roads.




A Palestinian boy sits on the rubble of a damaged shop, next to a street that was torn up by bulldozers during an Israeli raid in the center of Jenin in the occupied West Bank on Sept. 2, 2024. (AFP)

On Friday, agencies said residents used bulldozers of their own to begin clearing the rubble after Israeli armored vehicles left.

Israel has occupied the West Bank since 1967 and its forces regularly make incursions into Palestinian communities, but the latest raids as well as the hawkish comments by Gallant signaled an escalation, residents told AFP news agency.

The Israeli military has maintained a strong footing in the occupied territory for decades to protect the roughly 500,000 Israeli citizens living in settlements there.




Activists confront Israeli land-grabbers who tried to build a new outpost in the land of the Kisiya family in al-Makhrour, occupied West Bank, on August 22, 2024. After Israeli security forces turned the settlers away, peace activists and members of the Kisiya family retreated to their makeshift base. (AFP)

Despite international condemnation, the Netanyahu government has allowed illegal settlements to continue to expand across the West Bank.

In March this year, the Israeli government announced it was confiscating an area of roughly 1,980 acres in the northern Jordan Valley with a view to expanding Jewish settlements there.

On Friday, a 26-year-old Turkish American woman was killed in the West Bank during a protest where Israeli forces opened fire. Aysenur Ezgi Eygi was taking part in a protest against settlement expansion in Beita, a town near Nablus.




Palestinians and international activists carry portraits of slain Turkish-American activist Aysenur Ezgi Eygi, a member of Turkish-American International Solidarity Movement, who was shot dead on Sept. 7, 2024, while demonstrating against Israeli settlements in Beita in the occupied West Bank. (AFP)

Settler violence in the area also is nothing new. However, there has been a sharp increase in the number of attacks on Palestinians since the war in Gaza began.

According to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, there were at least 1,300 attacks between Oct. 7 and Sept. 2 this year.

The raids and settler violence have been taking place against the backdrop of the war in Gaza, which has left more than 40,000 Palestinians dead, according to Gaza’s health ministry, and created a major humanitarian crisis.

Despite international pressure, Netanyahu has resisted calls to strike a ceasefire deal with Hamas, which would see the return of the remaining hostages, the release of Palestinian prisoners, and an end to the fighting.

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Last week, Netanyahu presented a plan that included the destruction of the Netzarim Corridor — an 8-km stretch of land that connects the Mediterranean Sea with the former Karni crossing in northeastern Gaza.

He said reconstruction would not be permitted and that Palestinians would not be allowed to return to their homes in northern Gaza to prevent Hamas from establishing “nests” in the area.

Meanwhile, the Philadelphi Corridor, which separates Gaza from Egypt, would remain under Israeli control, and a third corridor would be built between Khan Younis and Rafah, which would also be under Israeli military control.




Israeli PM Netanyahu holding a press conference explaining his plan to put the so-called Philadelphi Corridor, which separates Gaza from Egypt, under Israeli control tok contain Hamas. (AFP)

What was perhaps more striking about the map used by Netanyahu during his news conference, however, was that the West Bank appeared to be completely annexed by Israel.

Asked by a reporter to elaborate on this, Netanyahu said: “I didn’t get into that. I was talking about Gaza. There is a whole issue of how to achieve peace between us. That’s another press conference.”

Whether Netanyahu’s government intends to open a new front in its war with the Palestinians and seize complete control of the West Bank remains unclear.

Reichman University’s Goldberg is skeptical about Netanyahu’s appetite for risk given the magnitude of unfinished business both in Gaza and the Lebanon border. “I doubt that Israel will bring larger forces into the West Bank,” he said. “It cannot afford to lose on yet another front.”
 

 


Delayed Gaza polio vaccinations to resume on Saturday, agencies say

Updated 01 November 2024
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Delayed Gaza polio vaccinations to resume on Saturday, agencies say

  • The final phase of the campaign had aimed to reach an estimated 119,000 children under 10 years old

GAZA: The third phase of a delayed polio vaccination campaign in Gaza will begin on Saturday, aid organizations said on Friday, after the rollout was derailed by Israeli bombardments, mass displacement and lack of access.
The polio campaign began on Sept. 1 after the World Health Organization (WHO) confirmed in August that a baby was partially paralyzed by the type 2 polio virus, the first such case in the territory in 25 years.
The humanitarian pause to conduct the campaign had been agreed but WHO and the UN children’s agency UNICEF said the area covered by the agreement had been substantially reduced from the previous pause in September, and would now cover only Gaza City.
The final phase of the campaign had aimed to reach an estimated 119,000 children under 10 years old in northern Gaza with a second dose of novel oral polio vaccine type 2 (nOPV2). However, achieving this target is now unlikely due to access constraints, the statement said.
COGAT, the Israeli army’s Palestinian civilian affairs agency, said it was helping to coordinate the three-day campaign and once it was complete, there would be an assessment to decide whether the schedule would be extended.
“This coordination will ensure that the population can safely reach medical centers where the vaccines will be administered,” it said in a statement.


Macron recognizes French soldiers killed Algerian independence hero in 1957

Updated 01 November 2024
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Macron recognizes French soldiers killed Algerian independence hero in 1957

  • France’s century-long colonization of Algeria and viciously fought 1954-62 war of independence left deep scars on both sides

PARIS: President Emmanuel Macron on Friday acknowledged that Larbi Ben M’hidi, a key figure in Algeria’s War of Independence against France, had been killed by French soldiers after his arrest in 1957, the French presidency said.
“He recognized today that Larbi Ben M’hidi, a national hero for Algeria... was killed by French soldiers,” the presidency said on the 70th anniversary of the revolt that sparked the war, in a new gesture of reconciliation by Macron toward the former colony.
France’s more than a century-long colonization of Algeria and the viciously fought 1954-62 war of independence have left deep scars on both sides.
In recent years, Macron has made several gestures toward reconciliation while stopping short of issuing any apology for French imperialism.
Since coming to power in 2017, Macron has sought “to look at the history of colonization and the Algerian War in the face, with the aim of creating a peaceful and shared memory,” the presidency said.
Ben M’hidi was one of six founding members of the National Liberation Front (FLN) that launched the armed revolt against French rule that led to the war.
The presidency said that according to the official version, Ben M’hidi after his arrest in February 1957 attempted to commit suicide and died during his transfer to the hospital.
But it said he had in fact been killed by soldiers under the command of General Paul Aussaresses, who admitted to this at the beginning of the 2000s.
In 2017, then-presidential candidate Macron dubbed the French occupation a “crime against humanity.”
A report he commissioned from historian Benjamin Stora recommended in 2020 further moves to reconcile the two countries, while ruling out “repentance” and “apologies.”
But Macron, who has sought to build a strong relationship with Algerian President Abdelmadjid Tebboune, in 2022 questioned whether Algeria existed as a nation before being colonized by France, drawing an angry response from Algiers.


Israel cabinet approves 2025 wartime budget

Updated 01 November 2024
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Israel cabinet approves 2025 wartime budget

  • Israel has been locked in a war with Hamas in Gaza, and since September it has been fighting the Lebanese group Hezbollah

JERUSALEM: Israel’s cabinet on Friday approved a 2025 national budget, a wartime financial package that far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said supported the country’s ongoing wars and encouraged economic growth.
For more than a year, Israel has been locked in a war with Hamas in Gaza, and since September it has been fighting the Lebanese group Hezbollah in Lebanon.
“The main objective of the 2025 budget is to maintain the security of the state and achieve victory on all fronts, while safeguarding the resilience of the Israeli economy,” Smotrich said.
The budget, totalling about 607.4 billion shekels ($162 billion), includes a nine billion shekel package to support reserve soldiers.
It will now move to the Knesset, or parliament, where Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s coalition holds a majority, making approval likely.
Netanyahu welcomed the cabinet’s approval of the budget, saying Smotrich had put together “an important, difficult but necessary budget in a year of war.”
Additional allocations would be made for the defense ministry, as the military fights the two wars, as well as Iran and the groups it backs.
“This budget will help and support the needs of the war so that it will lead to a victory that will allow the strong Israeli economy to grow and prosper for many years,” Smotrich said.
The budget projects a fiscal deficit of about 4.3 percent.
But former prime minister and key opposition leader Yair Lapid criticized the budget, saying it would “increase the expenditure of every family in Israel by 20,000 shekels per year.”


UK urged to evacuate hospitalized children from Gaza

Updated 01 November 2024
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UK urged to evacuate hospitalized children from Gaza

  • British charity Project Pure Hope: ‘We are witnessing a humanitarian disaster of historic proportions’
  • Kamal Aswan Hospital has just 2 doctors to look after more than 150 patients

LONDON: A British charity has urged the UK government to evacuate 21 critically ill children currently in a hospital in northern Gaza, Sky News reported.

The Kamal Adwan Hospital is besieged by Israeli forces and was recently raided by troops, who detained staff and left the facility with only two doctors to care for more than 150 patients.

It was also targeted by an Israeli airstrike on Thursday. Its supplies are reportedly running low and many of its facilities are no longer operational.

Project Pure Hope has called on the UK to facilitate the evacuation of vulnerable children trapped inside.

“We are witnessing a humanitarian disaster of historic proportions,” it said in a statement. “With each passing hour, the children’s chance of survival diminishes without advanced medical intervention — intervention that cannot be provided under the hospital’s current, catastrophic conditions.”

The charity said it has sufficient money to fund an evacuation of 21 children in critical condition at the hospital.

It added that it held a meeting with UK Foreign Office staff this week to discuss its plans, but so far the government has not agreed to take in patients.

“While other countries ... have opened their doors to these paediatric cases, the UK remains a notable outlier, having yet to implement any such programme,” the charity said.

The US, Switzerland, Italy Ireland and the UAE have taken in hospitalized children from Gaza since the start of the conflict over a year ago.

Fears for the safety of people in the area around the hospital have grown in recent weeks amid an uptick in Israeli military activity and Israel’s refusal to allow sufficient aid to reach displaced civilians.

Charities have warned of famine and disease, and aid workers struggle to move around Gaza, especially to the scene of military strikes to help civilian casualties.

Project Pure Hope’s concerns about the fate of patients at Kamal Adwan Hospital have been echoed by medical charity Medecins Sans Frontieres, which said it is “deeply concerned” by the situation after one of its staff members was detained by Israeli forces.

Israel claims that Hamas has been using the hospital, located in the Jabaliya refugee camp, as a base, and that it has found weapons stored at the facility. The hospital denies the allegation.


WHO ‘deeply concerned’ about ‘rising attacks’ on Lebanon health care

Updated 01 November 2024
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WHO ‘deeply concerned’ about ‘rising attacks’ on Lebanon health care

  • ‘… We are again and again and again emphasizing that health care is not a target; health workers are not a target’

GENEVA: The World Health Organization said Friday it is deeply concerned about Israeli attacks hitting health care workers and facilities in Lebanon, in its war against Hezbollah.
“We are really, really concerned, deeply concerned, about the rising attacks on health workers and the facilities in Lebanon, and we are again and again and again emphasizing that health care is not a target; health workers are not a target,” WHO spokeswoman Margaret Harris told a media briefing in Geneva.