Netanyahu orders West Bank lockdown after Hebron checkpoint shooting

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ordered the "full closure” of the occupied West Bank after five people were injured in a shooting at a military checkpoint near the city of Hebron.

“I have instructed the [military] and the security forces to immediately impose a cordon around the city of Hebron and to prepare for a full closure of the entire [West Bank], effective today,” Mr Netanyahu’s office said in a statement.

Israel’s military said it killed two suspects armed with a rifle and a handgun. Two of those injured were reported to be in a critical condition.

Palestinian media reports named the pair as family members Mohammad Jaaba and Firas Jaaba, both 27 and from Hebron. The military said the men had planned to carry out a "large-scale" attack on Israelis. There are a number of illegal Israeli settlements in Hebron.

Settler and military violence against Palestinians has swept across the West Bank during the olive harvest season, while Israel is preparing to hold elections that could unseat Mr Netanyahu’s ultranationalist coalition government, which has been in power for four years.

After the attack, Israel's far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, who lives in the illegal Hebron settlement of Kiryat Arba, called for the Palestinian Authority to be dismantled. It is supposed to control parts of the West Bank.

“We have to act before it’s too late. The Palestinian Authority must be dismantled and demilitarised, and its terror infrastructure wiped out completely,” he said.

Israel’s military chief of staff Lt Gen Eyal Zamir described the attack as “serious” and said a "large quantity of ammunition was found in the vehicle in which the terrorists arrived at the scene ... which was intended to be used to carry out a larger-scale attack”.