Three Palestinians were killed Thursday by Israeli troops in Nablus, in the occupied West Bank, the Israeli army announced.
Israel accused the three Palestinians of being behind an attack last month on a car near a Jewish settlement in the West Bank that killed an Anglo-Israeli woman and her two daughters.
In a statement, the Israeli army said it entered Nablus, in the occupied West Bank, on Thursday morning and after a heavy firefight killed three suspects.
The Israeli army said two of the men, identified as Hassan Katnani and Maed Mitsri, were Hamas militants. Israeli security forces identified the third man as Ibrahim Hura, who allegedly helped the other suspects in the attack.
The Palestinian Health Ministry announced Thursday that three people were killed in clashes in Nablus, in the West Bank, but did not identify the dead.
The violence in Nablus comes at a particularly sensitive time in the region, days after a prominent Palestinian died in prison following a hunger strike.
His death triggered a massive rocket attack by Muslim militants from the Gaza Strip and subsequent Israeli airstrikes on the Palestinian enclave.
For more than a year, Israel has carried out raids on villages, towns and cities in the occupied West Bank, allegedly motivated by a wave of Palestinian attacks on Israelis.
Israel argues that these operations are aimed at dismantling Muslim fighter networks and preventing future attacks.
Palestinians see the Israeli operations as another step in Israel’s 56-year occupation of the lands it claims for a future independent Palestinian state.
Since the first attacks were launched, nearly 250 Palestinians have been killed. During that same period, nearly 50 people were killed in Palestinian attacks on Israelis.
Source: TSF
