At least nine Palestinians killed as Israel raids West Bank cities

• At least nine Palestinians have been killed in the occupied West Bank, in what Israel says is a “counter-terrorism operation”

• Hamas has confirmed that six of its fighters have died in Jenin – one of four Palestinian cities targeted by the Israeli military

• The others are Tulkarm, Nablus and Tubas, with the Israeli operation having begun at midnight local time

• The raids are believed to be the first time since the second intifada – a major Palestinian uprising from 2000 to 2005 – that several Palestinian cities have been targeted simultaneously

• Meanwhile in Gaza, the Hamas-run health ministry says 58 people have been killed in Israeli attacks over the past day

Live Reporting

Edited by Francesca Gillett and Sam Hancock in London, with Lucy Williamson reporting from the West Bank and Alice Cuddy from Jerusalem

1. 

   As night falls here, Palestinians will wonder what’s nextpublished at 17:40 British Summer Time

   Jon Donnison
   Reporting from Ramallah in the West Bank

   In a Middle East that is already fraught with tension, this is another dangerous moment.

   Israel’s most widespread military operation in the occupied West Bank is ongoing with reports in the last hour of fierce gun battles between Israeli forces and Palestinian militants in the northern city of Jenin.

   Israel has called it a “counter-terrorism operation”, but civilians are being caught up in the violence.

   As night falls, many in the region will be watching nervously to see where it goes from here.

   Palestinians will fear more Israeli raids and drone strikes overnight. Tomorrow, there will be funerals for those who were killed today.

   It’s another potential flashpoint.

   The fear is that the war in Gaza, which has been going on for almost a year, could spread into a wider regional conflict.

2. Before we go, here’s what happened todaypublished at 17:36 British Summer Time

   Image source, Getty Images

   We’ll soon pause our live coverage of Israel’s military operations in the West Bank – the most widespread in the territory since the second intifada at the start of the millennium.

   Before then, here’s what you need to know:

   • At midnight, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) launched raids in four Palestinian cities – Jenin, Tulkarm, Nablus and Tubas – killing at least nine people, with Hamas saying six of its fighters died in Jenin
   • There have been gun battles between Israeli soldiers and Palestinian fighters, and eyewitness reports of Israeli forces surrounding hospitals in the targeted cities
   • Israel’s foreign minister labelled it a counter-terrorism operation to thwart what he called “Islamic-Iranian terrorist infrastructures” in the West Bank
   • The UN Human Rights Office (OHCHR) condemned Israeli security force’s “increasingly military response” in the occupied territory
   • Meanwhile in Gaza, the Hamas-run health ministry said at least 58 people had been killed in the past day, taking the death toll there to more than 40,500

   To read more about what happened today, head here.

   This page was written by Johanna Chisholm, Emily McGarvey, Adam Durbin, Matt Spivey, Rachel Flynn, Gabriela Pomeroy and Barbara Tasch. It was edited by Aoife Walsh, Francesca Gillett and Sam Hancock.

3. Palestinian charity says it is facing difficulties reaching injured peoplepublished at 17:26 British Summer Time

   Alice Cuddy
   Reporting from Jerusalem

   Image source, Getty Images

   An official with the Palestinian Red Crescent Society (PRCS) in the West Bank says teams there have been facing difficulties reaching injured people and transporting them to hospitals.

   Ahmad Jibril says Israeli troops surrounding hospitals and the “exposure of crews to attacks” is slowing the work of paramedics, citing “what happened today to the medical point in al-Far’a camp”.

   The PRCS said earlier that Israeli soldiers today briefly entered their medical facility in the camp near Tubas, detaining workers and cutting off communication with them.

   The humanitarian organisation later said that soldiers assaulted the centre’s director and fired shots inside the building before withdrawing.

   The Israeli military has been asked for comment. They have not yet responded but have previously said they’re conducting “counter terrorism operations” in the al-Fara area.

4. EU’s top diplomat warns Israel minister over holy site ‘threat’published at 17:24 British Summer Time

   The European Union’s high representative for foreign affairs, Josep Borrell Fontelles, has expressed concern about what he calls Israel’s “repeated violations of the status quo of the holy sites” in Jerusalem.

   In a social media post he says holy sites are “under continued threat” including from Israel’s far-right security minister Itamar Ben-Gvir.

   Ben-Gvir recently led hundreds of Jewish Israelis into Jerusalem’s most contested holy site – the al-Aqsa Mosque – with many defying the Israeli government’s long-standing ban on Jewish prayer there.

   Known to Jews as Temple Mount, the site in occupied East Jerusalem is a holy place for both Muslims and Jews. It was captured by Israel from Jordan in the 1967 Middle East war.

   Under the status quo since then, Jordan was allowed to continue its historical role as custodian of the site, while Israel assumed control of security and access. The Israeli PM’s office previously said there had been no change to the status quo agreement.

5. ‘There are other people waiting’, says hostage rescued from Gazapublished at 17:08 British Summer Time

   Away from the updates from the West Bank for a moment, a Bedouin Arab hostage who was yesterday rescued from an underground tunnel in Gaza has returned home.

   Kaid Farhan Elkadi, 52, was rescued on Tuesday, the Israeli military said, after he was kidnapped by Hamas during the 7 October attack on Israel.

   In a phone call with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu from hospital, Elkadi says he has been “waiting for this moment” but said “there are other people waiting”.

   Pictures show the father of 11 returning home to his village near Rahat in southern Israel.

   Image source, EPA

   Image source, EPA

6. Israeli soldiers ‘continue to take people for questioning’published at 16:56 British Summer Time

   Alice Cuddy
   Reporting from Jerusalem

   We’ve just made contact with a local journalist near Tubas, who describes the situation in al-Far’a camp as “strangely quiet” despite the presence of Israeli troops.

   He says there is “no gunfire or explosions” that he can hear, but that “drones are still in the sky”.

   He adds that Israeli soldiers are “raiding houses” in the area and taking people for questioning at a military checkpoint.

   As we reported earlier, the Israel Defense Forces say that “four armed terrorists” were killed in an aerial “counter-terrorism operation” overnight.

   “The forces confiscated weapons and exposed and dismantled explosives that were planted under the roads in the area,” the IDF said.

   Image source, Getty Images

7. Photos show debris lining streets of Nur Shams camppublished at 16:40 British Summer Time

   We’re seeing pictures now of the damage and debris left behind after raids in the Nur Shams camp in Tulkarm, located in the north of the West Bank and one of the cities where Israel says it is carrying out its “counter-terrorism operation”.

   One man, who spoke to the BBC, says people would usually leave the camp ahead of Israeli operations, but this time “it caught us by surprise”.

   Image source, Getty Images

   Image source, Getty Images

   Image source, Getty Images

8. How West Bank violence has escalated… in 140 wordspublished at 16:27 British Summer Time

   On 7 October, Hamas crossed from Gaza into Israel and killed around 1,200 people – 250 others were taken hostage.

   Israel retaliated with a bombing campaign and ground invasion into Gaza, where Hamas are based, resulting in more than 40,000 Palestinians being killed.

   Tensions in the West Bank – which has been under Israeli occupation since the 1967 Middle East war – were already simmering before the Gaza war began, particularly in Jenin where a new generation of armed groups was emerging.

   Last Wednesday, the UN said 607 Palestinians had been killed in the West Bank since 7 October. Fifteen Israelis were killed by Palestinians in the territory during the same period.

   A spokesman for Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas – in charge of a chunk of the West Bank – has warned that the escalating Israeli raids will “lead to dire and dangerous results”.

9. Understanding the various West Bank settlementspublished at 16:15 British Summer Time

   Israel has built about 160 settlements, housing some 700,000 Jews, since it occupied the West Bank and East Jerusalem – land the Palestinians want as part of a future state – in the 1967 Middle East war.

   The settlements are considered illegal under international law, although Israel disputes this.

   It can be tricky to understand so our visual journalism colleagues have mapped it out, which you can see below. The four cities where Israel has carried out raids today are also marked with black dots:

   

10. US announces new sanctions on settlers in West Bankpublished at 16:08 British Summer Time

    In the last hour, the US has announced new sanctions affecting some Jewish settlers in the West Bank over violence against Palestinians.

    The US issued its first sanctions against settlers in February this year – a rare step – and later went on to sanction more., external

    Today, the US State Department says it is now sanctioning Hashomer Yosh, an Israeli non-governmental organisation that provides material support to several of those already sanctioned.

    It is also sanctioning Yitzhak Levi Filant, the security coordinator of the Yitzhar settlement near Nablus, because he has “engaged in malign activities” and led a group of armed settlers to attack Palestinians “and forcefully expel them from their lands”, the US says.

    State Department spokesman Matthew Miller says Israel needs to hold those who commit settler violence more accountable.

11. Hamas confirms six of its fighters killed in Jeninpublished at 15:31 British Summer Time

    The armed wing of Hamas, the al-Qassam Brigades, has confirmed in a statement that six of its fighters have been killed in Jenin today.

    Earlier, the Israeli military said it had killed three “armed terrorists” in Jenin in an air strike, with two more killed by ground forces in the area of Jenin and Tulkarm.

12. Ex-IDF official says Iran is ‘flooding’ the West Bank with weaponspublished at 15:22 British Summer Time

    Image source, EPA

    Israel’s action in the West Bank is an “operation against Iranian weapons and terror organisations”, the former IDF spokesman Jonathan Conricus has told BBC Radio 4’s World at One programme.

    Conricus – who is now a fellow at the Washington-based Foundation for Defence of Democracies think tank – says explosives, assault rifles and pistols are being smuggled into the West Bank through the Jordanian border.

    “Iran is flooding the West Bank with weapons,” he says.

    Today’s raids, he says, are Israel “defending itself against Palestinian terrorists. It is a very dangerous situation for Israeli citizens.”

13. 

    What next? The fear here is that it could be more fightingpublished at 15:07 British Summer Time

    Jon Donnison
    Reporting from Ramallah in the West Bank

    It’s just over a week since the US Secretary of State Antony Blinken visited Israel in his efforts to try to de-escalate tensions and ensure a ceasefire and hostage release deal in Gaza.

    He called for all players in the region to avoid provocative actions.

    After the weekend’s dramatic escalation in violence between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon, Palestinians and much of the Arab world will see today’s wide-scale Israeli military operations in the occupied West Bank as a provocation.

    Nothing on this scale has been seen in two decades, since the second Palestinian intifada or uprising.

    Israel says it is determined to deal with what it calls the “threat” from Palestinian militants in the West Bank. It’s already fighting on two fronts: in Gaza and on its northern border with Lebanon.

    The fear here is that war could come to the West Bank, too.

14. Palestinian activist condemns ‘unilateral war’published at 14:48 British Summer Time

    

    Mustafa Barghouti, leader of the Palestinian National Initiative party, has just been telling the BBC that today’s events in the West Bank suggest the “Israeli army is trying to bring the war… from Gaza to the West Bank”.

    “What you see here is a unilateral war by a huge Israeli army with air force attacking basically civilian population in the West Bank,” Barghouti says, accusing Israel of violating international law.

    He also claims the Israeli military has issued evacuation orders to people in Nur Shams refugee camp – something that has not been confirmed. Our colleagues in Jerusalem have spoken to three people in the camp who say there are no evacuation orders that they are aware of, but that they have been given a time period in which they can leave the camp, passing through a military checkpoint, if they choose to.

    “It’s exactly like they have done in Gaza,” Barghouti says of Israel, “where they’ve forced people to be displaced and to leave their homes and become refugees again.”

15. ‘You hear the sound of gunfire and the sound of bulldozers’published at 14:32 British Summer Time

    Alice Cuddy
    Reporting from Jerusalem

    We’ve been hearing from another resident in the Nur Shams camp in Tulkarm.

    “They closed all the main roads that lead to Nur Shams,” she says. “All the streets are closed.”

    She says there is currently a raid happening in one of the camp’s neighbourhoods, with soldiers seen by residents going from house to house.

    “The situation from midnight until now is that you cannot know exactly what’s happening – you hear the sound of gunfire and explosions, and the sound of bulldozers.”

    Image source, Getty Images

16. Dozens killed in Gaza in past day, Hamas-run health ministry sayspublished at 13:57 British Summer Time

    Today’s page has been focusing on the Israeli raids in the occupied West Bank, which comes after months of escalating violence there since the war in Gaza broke out.

    As we reported earlier, the West Bank has seen many clashes between Palestinian armed groups and Israeli forces following Hamas’s 7 October attacks on southern Israel – in which around 1,200 people were killed and more than 200 taken hostage.

    In Gaza, the Hamas-run health ministry says 58 people have been killed in attacks over the past day, taking the death toll from Israel’s retaliatory war to more than 40,500.

    According to reports, an Israeli attack near a school housing displaced families in Deir al-Balah, central Gaza, killing at least eight Palestinians.

    People in Khan Younis in southern Gaza say Israeli tanks have advanced into the centre of the city, where health officials report at least 11 people have been killed.

    Meanwhile, the Israeli military says it has destroyed a three-kilometre (two-mile) long tunnel in central Gaza, adding that it’s forces have “eliminated dozens of terrorists and dismantled hundreds of terrorist infrastructure” in recent weeks.

    

17. ‘The camp is surrounded’, says Tulkarm manpublished at 13:32 British Summer Time

    Alice Cuddy
    Reporting from Jerusalem

    Image source, Getty Images

    We’re speaking to people in the Nur Shams camp in Tulkarm – one of the areas in the north of the West Bank where Israel says it is carrying out its “counter-terrorism operation”.

    One man says the Israeli military was surrounding the camp and that there were “multiple clash points”.

    Another resident in the area, Suleiman Zuhairi, also says the camp is surrounded, and that streets in the area have been blocked or destroyed by bulldozers and military vehicles.

    He says the IDF had “taken control of areas and created inspection points”.

    At the moment, “everyone who wants to leave can but they will have to pass an IDF checkpoint and be inspected.”

    Israeli military personnel had said they would remain for “quite a while”, he adds.

    In the past, he says people would leave the camp ahead of Israeli operations, but this time “it caught us by surprise”.

18. Latest pictures from the West Bankpublished at 12:58 British Summer Time

    Some more pictures have been coming in from the occupied West Bank cities where the Israeli military have been carrying out raids.

    Image source, AFP via Getty Images

    Image source, EPA

    Image source, EPA

19. 

    Israel fears the West Bank is spinning out of controlpublished at 12:46 British Summer Time

    Paul Adams
    Diplomatic correspondent

    This morning’s major, multi-pronged operation in the West Bank is the latest sign that Israel fears the area is spinning out of control.

    Israel was already confronting a new generation of armed groups, notably in Jenin, before the war in Gaza erupted last October.

    But now a battle is raging in a number of refugee camps across the northern part of the West Bank, including those attacked today.

    “It’s like a cancer. It’s spreading,” Gen Israel Ziv, the former head of the IDF’s operations division, told me earlier this month.

    “There’s no doubt that the intensity in Samaria (Israel’s term for the northern part of the West Bank) is now equal or even more than the intensity of the war in Gaza.”

    Israel regards the emergence of the new armed groups as part of an Iranian effort to keep Israel preoccupied on as many fronts as possible.

    Tehran, officials say, is responsible for funding and, in some cases, arming the militants (via smuggling routes through Syria and Jordan).

    “It’s a 100% Iranian effort to build a proxy in Samaria,” Gen Ziv said.

    Until now, the Israeli military has more or less controlled the situation.

    But the IDF’s more aggressive tactics – including air strikes, highly destructive raids into refugee camps and a mounting civilian death toll – run the risk of turning the armed groups into local heroes, with more and more young Palestinians willing to mobilise.

    When you add the Israeli government’s latest moves to create new Jewish settlements throughout the West Bank, and the increasingly violent actions of some Jewish settlers, the result is an increasingly combustible atmosphere.

    “Definitely we’re not controlling the escalation over there,” Gen Ziv said.

20. An eerie quiet here on Jenin’s streetspublished at 12:24 British Summer Time

    Lucy Williamson
    Middle East correspondent, reporting from Jenin

    

    I’m just walking up the main street in Jenin towards the government hospital.

    It is eerily quiet, there’s nobody about – the streets are completely deserted.

    There’s just the lone wail of an ambulance every now and then heading away from the hospital, as well as the sweet, sickly smell of mangoes left out untended under the hot sun.

    One ambulance has just headed back into the hospital past the line of reporters – and beyond it, the Israeli military vehicles.