West Bankupdated 45m ago3 min read
Benjamin Netanyahu Orders Full Lockdown Of Occupied West Bank After Hebron Shooting
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Netanyahu ordered a lockdown of Hebron and a full West Bank closure starting Friday. Two Palestinians were killed after the Hebron shooting and clashes with Israeli forces.
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Lockdown after Hebron shooting
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ordered a full lockdown of the occupied West Bank after the Israeli military repelled an attack in the city of Hebron.
Netanyahu said the order on Friday morning came shortly after the Israeli military said it had killed two Palestinian gunmen who attacked a reserve battalion near the Israeli settlement of Telem.
Israeli sources said two Palestinians driving a car with an Israeli licence plate began shooting towards soldiers near one of the many military checkpoints surrounding Hebron, and Israel’s ambulance service reported at least five Israeli soldiers were injured, with two in critical condition.
Witnesses said the shooting lasted for 20 minutes, and the Israeli military later reported it had arrested two Palestinians and locked down Hebron while Netanyahu cancelled a series of election-related engagements.
Itamar Ben-Gvir called for Israel to take full control of the West Bank and said, “We have to act before it’s too late. The Palestinian Authority must be dismantled and demilitarised, and its terror infrastructure wiped out completely,” as Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) praised the attack.
Arrests and competing narratives
Al Jazeera’s Nida Ibrahim reported from Ramallah that settlers and Israeli security forces maintained pressure on the Palestinian population as “there has been a ramp-up in attacks by settlers against Palestinians in the occupied West Bank,” and Israeli forces arrested 36 Palestinians during raids across the West Bank on Thursday. In Jenin governorate, Israeli forces raided towns and villages and arrested 10 Palestinians, while the town of Tuqu in the Hebron governorate was raided and soldiers arrested former prisoner Shorok al-Badan along with five other people, according to Wafa. The Colonization and Wall Resistance Commission said it documented 17 pogroms by Israeli forces and settlers on Thursday against Palestinian farmers and their land during the olive harvest, including assaulting farmers, preventing them from reaching their land, stealing crops and farm equipment, and damaging and burning olive trees.
Hamas celebrated the attack and urged armed Palestinians to intensify confrontations, and Hamas said, “We call on all those who carry weapons (...) to direct their bullets at the chests of the occupiers, their soldiers and their criminal settlers, who continue to commit the most atrocious crimes against our people in the West Bank, Jerusalem, and the Gaza Strip,” in a press release. DW reported that Netanyahu cancelled Likud campaign events after the shooting and quoted Netanyahu’s X account saying, “Kudos to our brave fighters who acted with determination and prevented a major attack,” while DW also described the measure as a “total lockdown” across Judea and Samaria starting today.
Election pressure and wider fallout
Multiple outlets tied the lockdown order to the election timeline, with Al Jazeera saying the attack and clampdown came amid heightened tensions before Tuesday’s Israeli elections, and DW stating the shooting occurred as Israeli voters prepared to decide in elections next Tuesday, October 27. Al Jazeera reported that Netanyahu cancelled a series of election-related engagements after the Israeli military arrested two Palestinians and locked down Hebron, while DW said Netanyahu issued instructions to cancel all political events planned by Likud this morning after the serious attack at the Judea crossing. The Jerusalem Post described Netanyahu ordering the city of Hebron to be cordoned off and the entire West Bank to be blocked from entry and exit starting on Friday morning, and it said the IDF and Shin Bet were investigating whether the two terrorists were part of a small self-contained cell or a larger terror cell.
The Jerusalem Post also quoted Magen David Adom emergency medical technician Zuriel Edri saying, “We evacuated additional wounded people to MDA ambulances that had arrived at the scene and immediately began transporting them to hospitals,” as five people were wounded with two in critical condition. Al Jazeera said the incident came as attacks on olive harvesters had been rife, and it reported that Brad Lander was briefly detained on Wednesday while volunteering to help Palestinian farmers harvest olives in the West Bank, as the Colonization and Wall Resistance Commission said the pattern represented an escalation undermining Palestinians’ ability to access and cultivate their land and maintain their livelihoods.