Israeli ministers painting genocidal scenario for the West Bank
Israeli ministers painting genocidal scenario for the West Bank
TEHRAN- The recent deadly shooting attack in the occupied West Bank has highlighted anti-Israel sentiment amid its genocidal war in the Gaza Strip.
On Monday, gunmen opened fire on a bus and vehicles adjacent to the Palestina village of Funduq near Nablus city.
Three Israelis were killed and several others were injured in the incident.
The Israeli army immediately imposed a cordon around all villages in the area to apprehend the shooters.
The Palestinian Hamas resistance movement hailed the attack as a "heroic response against the occupation's continued crimes (including) the war of genocide in Gaza".
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed a harsh crackdown on the attackers and their supporters.
Israel's far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir said he had instructed the army to "act with force" in the pursuit of the assailants.
Smotrich suggests that the Israeli military destroy towns in the West Bank as retaliation for the shooting incident in Funduq and Ben Gvir envisions a level of violence akin to that seen in Gaza. "We will not tolerate a Gaza-like reality in Judea and Samaria (the West Bank), and anyone who follows Hamas' path in Gaza and enables or shelters the murder and harm of Jews will pay a heavy price," he wrote on X.
The Israeli army has slaughtered more than 45,850 Palestinians in Gaza since launching war on the enclave in October 2023.
It now seems that Ben Gvir is trying to convey a message that Israel may consider a Gaza-style scenario in the West Bank.
He has also used the term “Judea and Samaria” which is the biblical name by which Israel refers to the occupied West Bank. The far-right minister is, in fact, doubling down on Israel’s claim of sovereignty over the West Bank.
Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, another far-right member of Israel’s ruling coalition, echoed Ben Gvir’s remarks.
"Funduq, Nablus, and Jenin should look like Jabalia," he said in a statement.
Israel has devastated Jabalia since launching a new offensive in northern Gaza in early October 2024. It has carried out back-to-back massacres in the Palestinian town.
Israeli media says the Jabalia refugee camp has been left a “ghost town” with no buildings left intact.
Smotrich is now implying that the Israeli army should demolish Funduq, Nablus, and Jenin and butcher Palestinians there.
Since the onset of the conflict in Gaza, there has been a significant increase in violence in the West Bank.
According to the Palestinian Health Ministry in Ramallah, Israeli troops or settlers have killed more than 800 Palestinians in the West Bank in parallel with the genocidal war in Gaza.
Palestinian attacks on Israelis have killed more than two dozen settlers in the West Bank in the same period.
Israel has neither been able to cripple the Palestinian resistance in Gaza nor the West Bank.
The Israeli army has failed to eliminate Hamas in Gaza about 15 months after initiating the Gaza onslaught. Monday’s shooting in the West Bank also indicates that Israelis will face a recurring nightmare as long as the regime persists in its appalling atrocities against Palestinians.
source: tehrantimes.com