Israel Begins A Large-Scale Operation In Hebron; Around 1,200 Palestinians Forced From Their Homes

The Israeli military forced around 1,200 Palestinians to leave their homes in Hebron, in the occupied West Bank, on Saturday, a Palestinian official said, as Israel began a large-scale operation in the city a day after a Palestinian attack killed two Israeli soldiers.

The attack came on Friday morning, when two Palestinian gunmen opened fire at a military checkpoint near the entrance of Hebron, killing the two soldiers. The Israeli military said the gunmen were shot dead. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Friday that the military would launch a large-scale operation in response.

The operation is centered on the Al-Jaladah and Ein Deir Baha neighborhoods, near the military checkpoint at the entrance of Hebron. The Israeli military said its forces were searching for militants and weapons, and said in a statement that the military would carry out demolitions. The operation was continuing on Saturday.

Hebron is the largest Palestinian city in the West Bank and one of its oldest. Its old city holds the Ibrahimi Mosque, known to Jews as the Cave of the Patriarchs, a shrine holy to both faiths. Under an agreement reached in 1997, the city is divided into two sectors: H1, administered by the Palestinian Authority and home to most of the city’s residents, and H2, under Israeli military control, where a small number of Israeli settlers live among Palestinian residents. The old city streets around the shrine are divided by checkpoints and barriers, and the city has been a recurring flashpoint throughout the conflict.

Yousef Zouhair Al-Jabari, the head of Hebron’s municipality, said around 1,200 people had already been displaced, and that around 1,300 more faced losing their homes in addition to those already forced out. Al-Jabari said the military had demolished shops, factories, homes and roads in Hebron, and called the response disproportionate and unjustified.

Residents in Hebron told Reuters that the military expelled many people with no connection to the Palestinian attackers. The Palestinian Authority criticised the operation as a “collective punishment.”

Arrests accompanied the expulsions. The Palestinian Prisoners’ Club, a non-governmental organisation, said Israeli forces had arrested around 70 Palestinians on Friday and Saturday. Israeli officials have not commented on any arrests.

Al-Jabari also gave the operation a political motive, saying it was driven by Israel’s parliamentary elections on Tuesday, October 27, when opinion polls show Netanyahu’s right-wing coalition may lose its majority. “Netanyahu and the radical ministers in his government are trying to win as many votes as possible from the settlers,” Al-Jabari said. That is his claim, stated as he made it; Israel’s stated purpose for the operation is the search for militants and weapons after the checkpoint attack.

Reuters notes that Netanyahu’s government has presided over an expansion of settlements during its time in office. The operation in Hebron — the largest Palestinian city in the West Bank — is the military’s answer to Friday’s killings, and its scale, measured in whole neighborhoods emptied, is what the municipality’s numbers describe: 1,200 people out of their homes on the first day, with more than that number again facing the same order.

Sources: Reuters.