West Bank

West Bank Palestinians risk crossing Israeli border to flee failing economy

At dawn in mid-May, Sayyed Ayyed and dozens of other unemployed Palestinian men gathered at the foot of the towering wall of concrete and barbed wire dividing the occupied West Bank from Israel. A smuggler was there with a ladder and ropes. Each man handed over the equivalent of $100. Ayyed waited his turn as others clambered over. The 30-year-old father of two young daughters hadn't found work for a year. Debts were mounting. Rent had to be paid. On the Israeli side, there was the lure of work on a construction site. He just had to get over the wall. When we reach the point where you see that your children do not have food, he said, the barrier of fear is broken. A year of war in Gaza has reverberated across the West Bank, where the World Bank warns the economy is at risk of collapse because of Israeli restrictions barring Palestinian laborers from entering the country for work, and the biggest wave of violence in decades. Unemployment has skyrocketed, reaching 30% from around 12

Indian origin Israeli soldier killed amid tensions in the West Bank

A 24-year-old Indian-origin Israeli soldier from the Bnei Menashe community was killed in a vehicle-ramming attack close to the West Bank's Beit El settlement, community members said on Thursday. Staff Sergeant Geri Gideon Hanghal was a resident of Nof HaGalil and a soldier in the Kfir Brigade's Nahshon Battalion, the Israeli Army said. Community members told PTI that they were "in shock at the news of the loss of a young life" on Wednesday near Asaf Junction. His funeral will be held on Thursday, they said. Hanghal immigrated to Israel from the northeastern part of India in 2020. Some 300 Bnei Menashe youngsters are said to be doing Army duty during the current war, most of them serving in combat units. The Bnei Menashe, hailing from India's north-eastern states of Manipur and Mizoram, are believed to have descended from the Israelite tribe of Menasseh, one of the lost tribes of ancient times. Shlomo Amar, Sephardic Chief Rabbi, declared them descendants of Menasseh in 2005 pav

Shooting attack at West Bank-Jordan border crossing kills 3 Israelis

Three people were shot and killed Sunday at the border crossing between the West Bank and Jordan, Israeli officials said. The military said the gunman approached the Allenby Bridge Crossing from the Jordanian side in a truck and opened fire at Israeli security forces, who killed the assailant in a shootout. It said the three people killed were Israeli civilians. Israel's Magen David Adom rescue service said the three men who were killed were in their 50s. There was no immediate comment from Jordan, which made peace with Israel in 1994 but is fiercely critical of its policies toward the Palestinians. The Allenby crossing is mainly used by Israelis, Palestinians and international tourists. The Israeli-occupied West Bank has seen a surge of violence since Hamas' Oct 7 attack out of Gaza triggered the war there. Israel has launched near-daily military arrest raids into dense Palestinian residential areas, and there has also been a rise in settler violence and Palestinian attacks on ...

Israeli soldiers shot American woman at West Bank protest: Reports

Israeli soldiers killed an American woman demonstrating against settlements in the West Bank on Friday, according to a witness who said she was shot while posing no threat to Israeli forces and during a moment of calm after clashes earlier in the afternoon. Two Palestinian doctors said 26-year-old Aysenur Ezgi Eygi of Seattle was shot in the head. The US government confirmed Eygi's death but did not say whether the recent graduate of the University of Washington, who was also a Turkish citizen, had been shot by Israeli troops. The White House said it was deeply disturbed by the killing of a US citizen and called on Israel to investigate what happened. The Israeli military said it was looking into reports that troops had killed a foreign national while firing at an instigator of violent activity in the area of the protest. The killing came amid a surge of violence in the West Bank since the Israel-Hamas war began in October, with increasing Israeli raids, attacks by Palestinian ...

Polio vaccine campaign begins in Gaza day before fight expected to pause

A campaign to inoculate children in Gaza against polio and prevent the spread of the virus has begun, the Health Ministry has said, as Palestinians in the Hamas-governed enclave and the occupied West Bank reeled from Israel's military offensives. Meanwhile, Israel's military late Saturday in a terse announcement said it had located a number of bodies during combat in Gaza. The army was trying to identify the bodies, including whether they were hostages, but said the process would take several hours. We ask to refrain from spreading rumors, it said. There were no further details. A small number of children in Gaza received vaccine doses on Saturday, a day before the large-scale rollout and planned pause in fighting agreed to by Israel and the UN World Health Organisation. There must be a cease-fire so that the teams can reach everyone targeted by this campaign, said Dr Yousef Abu Al-Rish, Gaza's deputy health minister, describing scenes of sewage running through crowded tent camps. .

Israeli army kills five more West Bank militants, including local commander

The Israeli military says it has killed five more militants in a large-scale operation in the occupied West Bank, including a well-known local commander. There was no immediate Palestinian confirmation of the death of Mohammed Jaber, known as Abu Shujaa, a commander in the Islamic Jihad militant group in the Nur Shams refugee camp. The military said he was killed along with four other militants in a shootout with Israeli forces early Thursday after the five had hidden inside a mosque. It said Abu Shujaa was linked to numerous attacks on Israelis, including a deadly shooting in June, and was planning more. He was reported killed earlier this year, but then made a surprise appearance at the funeral of other militants, where he was hoisted onto the shoulders of a cheering crowd. The military said another militant was arrested in the operation in the West Bank city of Tulkarem, and that a member of Israel's paramilitary Border Police was lightly wounded. Israel launched a large-scale

Israel kills nine militants in West Bank amid ongoing cease-fire talks

Two Israeli airstrikes in the West Bank killed nine Palestinian militants on Saturday, Israel's army said, as violence flared again in the Israeli-occupied territory with tensions high over the war in Gaza and a potential regional escalation. Cease-fire discussions on Gaza continued, with an Israel delegation led by the Mossad chief briefly visiting Cairo, an Egyptian official said. The US has urged Israel to seize the chance for a cease-fire after the shock killing of Hamas' political leader in Iran, which Tehran blames on Israel. That killing and Israel's assassination of a Hezbollah commander in Lebanon have the region holding its breath for retaliation against Israel on either front, or both, after Iran and its proxies vowed to act. Hamas said its command had begun discussions on choosing a new leader. In the northern West Bank, the Israeli army said its forces first struck a vehicle in a rural area outside the city of Tulkarem early Saturday, killing the five occupants. The arm

Hamas commander among nine killed in Israeli airstrike in West Bank

An Israeli airstrike on a vehicle in the occupied West Bank killed five Palestinians, according to Israel's army and Palestinian media, as violence flares in the Israeli-occupied territory. The Israeli army said its forces struck a vehicle carrying five militants in a rural area northwest of the city of Tulkarem in the northwest West Bank early Saturday morning, as the occupants were on their way to carry out an attack. According to an Associated Press journalist and witnesses, the blast took place along a road connecting the Palestinian villages of Zeita and Qaffin. I was going to work in the morning and I heard an explosion here next to the house, said Taiser Abdullah, a Zeita resident. The official Palestinian news agency Wafa said the five slain Palestinians were taken to a nearby hospital, and that four of the bodies were burned and charred beyond recognition. The Palestinian health ministry has not commented on the deaths. Over 590 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli f

TMC leaders slam Budget as one for NDA, not India, says nothing for WB

Trinamool Congress (TMC) leaders on Tuesday said the budget presented by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman in the Lok Sabha has nothing for West Bengal and called it a budget for the ruling NDA and not for India. "This is a 'kursi bachao budget' (budget to save the chair)," TMC MP Kalyan Banerjee said. "This budget is aimed at saving (Prime Minister) Narendra Modi's position. It is a budget for the NDA, not for India," he said. "Last time they gave so many projects to Odisha. Now they (BJP) have won (the Assembly polls in the state), so there is nothing for Odisha. There is also nothing for Bengal," Banerjee said. TMC's Rajya Sabha MP Saket Gokhale alleged that there is an "open and shameless" discrimination against West Bengal in the budget. "Open and shameless discrimination yet again in this Union Budget. Union Govt excludes only Bengal from flood relief and reconstruction funds," he said in a post on X. "Giving funds to other states while intentionally ignoring and singling

More than 1.5 mn foreign Muslims arrive in Mecca for annual Hajj pilgrimage

Muslim pilgrims have been streaming into Saudi Arabia's holy city of Mecca ahead of the start of the Hajj later this week, as the annual pilgrimage returns to its monumental scale. Saudi officials say more than 1.5 million foreign pilgrims have arrived in the country by Tuesday, the vast majority by air, from across the world. More are expected, and hundreds of thousands of Saudis and others living in Saudi Arabia will also join them when the pilgrimage officially begins on Friday. Saudi officials have said they expect the number of pilgrims this year to exceed 2023, when more than 1.8 million people performed Hajj, approaching pre-pandemic levels. In 2019, more than 2.4 million Muslims made the pilgrimage. The pilgrims included 4,200 Palestinians from the occupied West Bank who arrived in Mecca earlier this month, according to the Palestinian Ministry of Awqaf and Religious Affairs. Palestinians in the Gaza Strip were not able to travel to Saudi Arabia for Hajj this year, because

Cargo ship hit by missile in suspected attack by Yemen's Houthi rebels

A missile struck an Antigua and Barbuda-flagged cargo ship in the Gulf of Aden on Sunday in a suspected attack by Houthi rebels in Yemen, authorities said. The missile hit the ship's forward station, starting a fire that those on board later put out, the private security firm Ambrey said. A second missile fired at the ship missed and people on board small boats in the vicinity opened fire on the ship during the incident, Ambrey added, though no one was hurt onboard. The British military's United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations center similarly reported an attack late Saturday in the same area off Aden, but provided no further details. Suspicion for the attack immediately fell on the Houthis. The rebels did not immediately claim the assault, though it can sometimes take hours or even days for them to acknowledge their attacks. The Houthis, who seized Yemen's capital nearly a decade ago and have been fighting a Saudi-led coalition since shortly after, have been targeting shipping .

Israel's army targets 'Hamas compound' in school; media says 39 killed

Israel's military said Thursday it targeted what it called a Hamas compound inside of a school in the Gaza Strip, an attack Hamas-affiliated media there reported killed at least 39 people. Information about the strike in the Nuseirat area remained contradictory Thursday morning, and The Associated Press could not immediately independently confirm details about the strike. Hamas' al-Aqsa television broadcaster offered the death toll, without offering a source for the figures. The Israeli military said its fighter jets struck the school run by the United Nations agency providing aid to the Palestinians, known by the acronym UNRWA. The Israeli military claimed, without immediately offering evidence, that Hamas and the Islamic Jihad used the school as cover for their operations. Before the strike, a number of steps were taken to reduce the risk of harming uninvolved civilians during the strike, including conducting aerial surveillance, and additional intelligence information, the Isra

Message from US campuses

Suppressing protests may be politically self-defeating

Israeli settlers rampage West Bank village, kill 1 Palestinian, wound 25

Dozens of angry Israeli settlers stormed into a Palestinian village in the Israeli-occupied West Bank on Friday, shooting and setting houses and cars on fire. The rampage killed a Palestinian man and wounded 25 others, Palestinian health officials said. The violence was the latest in an escalation in the West Bank that has accompanied the war in the Gaza Strip. An Israeli rights group said the settlers were searching for a missing 14-year-old boy from their settlement. After the rampage, Israeli troops said they were still searching for the teen. The killing came after an Israeli raid overnight killed two Palestinians, including a Hamas militant in confrontations with Israeli forces. Palestinian health officials say over 460 Palestinians have been killed in the West Bank by Israeli forces since the war erupted in October. The Israeli human rights group Yesh Din said that settlers stormed into the village of al-Mughayyir late Friday, searching for the Israeli boy. The group said tha

Anurag Thakur hits out at TMC, condemns atrocities in restive Sandeshkhali

Union Information and Broadcasting Minister Anurag Thakur has hit out at the Mamata Banerjee-led TMC government in West Bengal, accusing it of doing nothing to control the goons targeting innocent people in trouble-torn Sandeshkhali. Thakur was speaking to reporters on the sideline of a function in Bhota on Friday night. "The sad thing is that the West Bengal government is not doing anything... If women were not safe under the rule of a woman chief minister, then questions start to arise on the law-and-order situation in the state," he said. An intense political row involving the BJP and the Trinamool Congress has erupted after several women in Sandeshkhali, in the state's North 24 Parganas district, accused the regional party's strongman Shajahan Sheikh and his supporters of "land-grab and sexual assault". Fresh protests erupted in the village on Friday as locals torched the property of the accused Trinamool leaders and held demonstrations against the delay in arresting Sheikh. Th

West Bank settler population grew nearly 3%, Gaza war could give new push

The population of Israeli settlers in the occupied West Bank grew nearly 3 per cent in 2023, according to a new report based on population statistics from the Israeli government. The report, released on Sunday by the pro-settler group WestBankJewishPopulationStats.com, found the settler population jumped to 517,407 as of December 31, from 502,991 a year earlier. The settler population has grown over 15 per cent in the last five years, the report said. Last year, it passed the half-million mark, a major threshold. This year's report predicted "accelerated growth" in the coming years, claiming the October 7 Hamas attack on southern Israel, which triggered the current war in Gaza, persuaded many Israelis who were formerly opposed to settlement-building on occupied land to change positions. "Serious cracks have indeed developed in the wall of opposition to Jewish settlement of the West Bank," it said. Israel captured the West Bank, east Jerusalem and Gaza Strip in the 1967 Mideast war

Stop 'hide & seek' in arresting ED attack accused: Ananda Bose to WB police

"Officers should stop hunting with the hound and running with the hare. Do not sow the wind and reap the whirlwind," the Governor warned the police

Drive-by shooting, clashes in West Bank kill 7 Palestinians, 2 Israelis

An Israeli man was fatally shot at a busy intersection in the West Bank on Sunday, hours after a violent confrontation elsewhere in the Israeli-occupied territory left seven Palestinians and a member of Israel's paramilitary border police dead. In Sunday's drive-by shooting, assailants fired through the victim's front windshield, the Magen David Adom rescue service said. Paramedics arriving at the scene in the central West Bank found the man unresponsive in his car. The Israeli army said security forces were searching the area for the shooter. Israeli media reported that security forces found an abandoned car that was likely used to carry out the attack, and the suspect fled on foot. Hours earlier, a deadly confrontation erupted when Israeli security forces were on patrol to search for roadside bombs in Jenin, a town and adjacent refugee camp by the same name in the northern West Bank. A roadside bomb exploded near a vehicle of the paramilitary border police, killing a policewoman

Top Hamas official Saleh al-Arouri killed in Israeli drone strike in Beirut

An explosion in Beirut on Tuesday killed Saleh Arouri, a top official with the Palestinian militant group Hamas and three others, officials with Hamas and the Lebanese group Hezbollah said. Lebanon's state-run National News Agency said the blast killed four people and was carried out by an Israeli drone. Israeli officials declined to comment. If Israel is behind the attack it could mark a major escalation in the Middle East conflict. Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah has vowed to retaliate against any Israeli targeting of Palestinian officials in Lebanon. Hamas official Bassem Naim confirmed to The Associated Press that Arouri was killed in the blast. A Hezbollah official speaking on condition of anonymity in line with regulations also said Arouri was killed. Arouri, one of the founders of Hamas' military wing, had headed the group's presence in the West Bank. Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had threatened to kill him even before the Hamas-Israel war began on Octo

Human rights situation rapidly deteriorating in West bank: UN report

The report calls for an immediate end to the use of military weapons and means during law enforcement operations, an end to arbitrary detention and ill-treatment of Palestinians