Gaza, 16 August 2024 (TDI): Dozens of Israeli settlers have set fire to houses and cars in a village in the occupied West Bank, with the Palestinian health ministry saying at least one person has been killed.
The settlers – some of them wearing masks – threw Molotov cocktails and rocks as they attacked the village of Jit, near the town of Nablus, on Thursday evening, the Israel Defense Forces said.
The Palestinian health ministry said a local villager in his early 20s was dead and another person critically wounded in the chest. Israeli military said it was examining the report of the fatality.
Israeli political leaders condemned the attack, vowing to punish the perpetrators. One Israeli was detained in Jit, the military said.
Video is viral on social media purportedly showing houses and cars set ablaze in Jit late on Thursday.
Plumes of smoke are seen rising above the village.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said in a statement that those responsible for any criminal act will be prosecuted.
Israeli President Isaac Herzog wrote in a post on social media platform X that this is an extreme minority that harms the law-abiding community of settlers and the settlement as a whole and in the name and status of Israel in the world during a very sensitive and difficult period.
Law enforcement authorities must act immediately to bring those responsible to justice, Herzog added.
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In a statement, the IDF said its forces were sent in the village “within minutes” of receiving reports of violence, shooting in the air to disperse the crowds. Attackers were then removed from the site.
The IDF added that a joint probe was launched by its forces, Israel’s security agency Shin Bet and the Israeli police following the “serious incident”.
The United States said attacks by settlers were “unacceptable and must stop”.
