JERUSALEM (AP) — The Palestinian Health Ministry mentioned a 15-year-old boy was killed by Israeli fireplace throughout a military raid within the occupied West Bank on Monday. The taking pictures got here as 1000’s of Israelis led by at the very least seven Cabinet ministers marched to an evacuated settlement within the territory.
The march was a defiant sign that Israel’s most right-wing authorities in historical past is set to speed up settlement constructing on occupied lands regardless of worldwide opposition. It additionally poses a brand new check for Israel’s safety forces after days of unrest fueled by tensions over a contested Jerusalem holy web site.
Israeli police and armed forces forces have been being deployed to the northern West Bank — the scene of frequent tensions in current months – to safe the march, which comes after days of preventing in Jerusalem and alongside Israel’s northern and southern fronts.
The demonstration added to the already flamable ambiance in Jerusalem and the occupied West Bank that has accompanied the overlapping of main Jewish and Muslim holy days. Tensions between Israelis and Palestinians have reached a fever pitch in current weeks surrounding the Jerusalem shrine.
The Israeli military mentioned its troops have been working within the Aqabat Jaber refugee camp subsequent to Jericho within the West Bank. The Palestinian Health Ministry mentioned 15-year-old Mohammed Balhan was killed by military fireplace.
The military didn’t instantly reply to a request for remark concerning the incident.
The march to Eviatar, an unauthorized settlement outpost within the northern West Bank that was evacuated by the earlier Israeli authorities in 2021, was being led by hard-line ultranationalist Jewish settlers. Organizers are calling for the settlement’s reestablishment and legalization.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu heads probably the most non secular and ultranationalist authorities in Israel’s historical past. Several members of his Cabinet, together with Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich and National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir — each West Bank settlers — and at the very least 20 members of Knesset have been anticipated to participate within the march.
Visits to Eviatar have been formally banned by the navy since its evacuation, however that prohibition has been loosely enforced in current months. Israeli military spokesman Lt. Col. Richard Hecht mentioned the navy accepted Monday’s march, saying it might be “highly monitored and highly protected.”
Ohad Tal, a lawmaker with the Religious Zionist social gathering, mentioned that “there was no reason in the world to cancel the march.”
“We need to send a message — the message that we don’t intend to concede and we are here to stay,” he instructed Army Radio.
Tensions between Israel and the Palestinians have soared following final week’s police raid on Jerusalem’s Al-Aqsa Mosque compound throughout the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.
The hilltop shrine is the emotional floor zero of the Israeli-Palestinian battle. For Jews, it is named the Temple Mount, their religion’s holiest web site and the place the place two temples stood in antiquity. For Muslims, it is named the Noble Sanctuary, dwelling of the Al-Aqsa Mosque, the third holiest web site in Islam.
Dozens of Jewish guests entered the location on Monday escorted by Israeli police for a second consecutive day. These excursions by non secular and nationalist Jews have elevated in measurement and frequency lately, elevating fears by Palestinians that Israel might partition the location. Israel insists it has no intention of adjusting the longstanding association that allows Jewish visits, however not worship, on the Muslim-administered shrine.
Last week, Palestinians barricaded themselves inside Al-Aqsa with stones and firecrackers, demanding the appropriate to hope there in a single day, one thing Israel has prior to now solely allowed over the past 10 days of Ramadan. Police eliminated them by pressure, detaining a whole bunch and leaving dozens injured.
The violence on the shrine was adopted by rocket fireplace by Palestinian militants from the Gaza Strip, southern Lebanon, and Syria beginning Wednesday, and Israeli airstrikes focusing on these areas. Recent days have additionally seen Palestinian assaults that killed two Israelis and an Italian vacationer.
Palestinian assaults have killed at the very least 19 folks in Israel for the reason that begin of the yr, together with one soldier. At least 92 Palestinians and have been killed by Israeli fireplace to this point this yr, at the very least half of them affiliated with militant teams, in accordance with a tally by The Associated Press.
Israel captured the West Bank, together with the Gaza Strip and east Jerusalem, within the 1967 Mideast warfare. It has constructed dozens of settlements within the territory that are actually dwelling to greater than 500,000 Jewish settlers.
Most of the worldwide neighborhood considers Israel’s West Bank settlements unlawful and an impediment to peace with the Palestinians. The Palestinians search the West Bank, together with Gaza and east Jerusalem for his or her future unbiased state.
Netanyahu’s authorities has made settlement enlargement a prime precedence.
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