Israeli security forces killed two Palestinians this Friday in the city of Qalqilya, northwest of the occupied territory of West Bankwhen they were traveling in a vehicle in the center of this city, witnesses and police sources confirmed, who identified the victims as alleged militiamen of the Jihad Islamic.
In a very graphic video spread on networks, you can see a face down lifeless bodylying between the half-open driver’s door of a white car, and how Israeli special forces remove a second dead Palestinian from the passenger seats, whose body falls to the asphalt.
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On the ground you can see what could be a third bodyor a kind of dressed mannequin.
Palestinian sources They report that the police have prevented Palestinian ambulances from approaching the scene of the incident, which remains cordoned off, and that they have taken away the bodies of the victims.
According to a police statement, they were two militants from the Palestinian Islamic Jihad group, who were armed and planned to carry out an attack in the area. The operation was carried out by the elite police force Gideonimin coordination with the Army and the internal intelligence service (Shin Bet).
The Palestinian Ministry of Health identified the deceased as Mahmoud Hassan Abdel Rahman Zaid (28 years old) and Ihab Abdel Karim Musa Abu Hamed (29 years). The second seems to have been a commander of the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigadeslinked to Fatah but that encompass various subgroups.
With their deaths there are now nine Palestinians killed by Israeli fire in the governorate of Qalqilya so far in 2024, according to EFE data based on the deaths announced by the Palestinian Ministry of Health in 2024. In all West Bankincluding Jerusalem Thisthere are now 221 deaths, with the centers of greatest violence being the governorates of Jenin (with 59 dead) and Tulkarem (54).
The occupied West Bank is experiencing its greatest spiral of violence since the Second Intifada (2000-05) and closed 2023 as the deadliest year in two decades, with more than 520 deaths, more than 60% of them between October and December, after the attack of Hamas.
On the Israeli side, fourteen people have died in 2024: twelve in nine Palestinian attacks, among them six uniformed personnel and six civilians (five of them settlers residing in West Bank); in addition to a soldier in Jenin who detonated an explosive and a special forces police officer in a raid on Tulkarem.
