LONDON: A Palestinian woman and members of an NBC News team were injured after being attacked by masked Israeli settlers in the occupied West Bank on Saturday, according to the US broadcaster.
NBC News said correspondent Matt Bradley and three colleagues were interviewing 51-year-old Aida Ahmed Abdullah and members of her family in the town of Jalud, near Nablus, when the attack took place.
Abdullah had told the network that settlers had forced her family from their home. As the group walked down a hill toward the property, a vehicle bearing Israeli license plates reversed toward them before at least four masked men got out.
According to NBC News, the men assaulted members of the group with sticks and threw stones at them before returning to the vehicle.
“They jumped out, beat us, then jumped back in the car,” Bradley told the network.
He was struck twice in the arm and received treatment at a nearby clinic. Three other members of the NBC News team were also injured and treated, while Abdullah was taken for medical care by the Palestinian Red Crescent. Her injuries were reported to be non-life-threatening.
NBC News producer Lawahez Jabari said she saw the attackers carrying sticks and also saw a firearm, though it was not used.
Camera operator Khaldoon Eid told the broadcaster the team had not expected to come under attack while working inside a Palestinian village.
The incident came amid a series of confrontations in the area on Saturday. NBC News also reported that Palestinian workers in nearby Qusra were pepper-sprayed by masked Israeli settlers.
Israeli security forces told the network they had received reports of violent clashes involving stone-throwing against Palestinians and other civilians.
In a statement cited by NBC News, Israeli forces said dozens of rioters had barricaded themselves inside a Palestinian home while residents were still inside. Security forces said they removed the rioters, separated the groups and confiscated vehicles suspected of having been used to transport Israelis to the area.
The Israeli military and Border Police remained deployed in Qusra and Jalud to prevent further disturbances, the statement added.
NBC News said tensions had already been rising in the area after a group of settlers earlier this month began blocking supplies from reaching Palestinian homes on the outskirts of the village near Nablus, leaving residents effectively trapped inside.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu condemned what he described as “criminal acts of violence” by “a handful of rioters.”
He said those responsible were breaking the law, harming law-abiding settlers, obstructing the Israeli military and damaging Israel’s international standing.
The Israeli government has faced mounting criticism over its response to settler violence in the occupied West Bank.
According to figures from the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs cited in the original report, Israeli forces or settlers killed 76 Palestinians in the West Bank in the year to July 24, while three Israelis were killed during the same period.
