Israel destroys neighbourhood in Jenin refugee camp, damaging hospital

Sunday, February 2, 2025

Israel destroys neighbourhood in Jenin refugee camp, damaging hospital

February 2, 2025

Alex MacDonald and Fayha Shalash

Israel has pounded Jenin refugee camp and destroyed residential buildings as part of its ongoing large-scale operations in the occupied West Bank.

Smoke billows from the site of multiple explosions during an Israeli raid in the occupied West Bank city of Jenin on 2 February 2025 (Mohammad Mansour/AFP)

Footage released by locals on social media appeared to show a large swathe of the camp being destroyed.

The Wafa news agency said Israeli forces simultaneously blew up nearly 20 buildings on the eastern side of the camp after rigging them with explosives.

The director of the main governmental hospital in Jenin, Wisam Baker, told the news agency that some sections of the hospital had been damaged as a result of the explosions.

So far, no casualties have been reported.

Earlier on Sunday, a 73-year-old Palestinian man was shot dead in Jenin, according to Wafa.

The Palestine Red Crescent Society (PRCS) reported that its crews recovered the body of Walid Lahlouh from the entrance of the camp, transferring it to the hospital.

Lahlouh's killing brings the total number of Palestinians killed since Israel launched its military assault on Jenin 13 days ago to 25.

According to Wafa, Israeli bulldozers have levelled around 100 homes in the camp, with local hospitals facing severe water shortages after Israeli forces damaged pipelines.

Around 35 percent of the city's population cannot access water.

Since the beginning of the war in Gaza on 7 Oct0ber 2023, Israeli soldier and settler attacks in the West Bank have skyrocketed, leaving hundreds dead.

Mosque torched

In the early hours of Sunday, Israeli settlers set fire to a mosque in the Arab al-Mleihat community, northwest of Jericho in the occupied West Bank.

Hassan Mleihat, general supervisor of the local Al-Baydar Organisation for the Defence of Bedouin Rights, told Wafa that the settlers poured a flammable substance inside the mosque before setting it ablaze.

The fire destroyed everything in the mosque, even the copies of the Qur’an that were in it, and efforts were unsuccessful in extinguishing the fire.

Community official Suleiman Mlihat told Middle East Eye that four settlers infiltrated the area between the cities of Ramallah and Jericho in the dawn hours, coming from the pastoral settlement outpost they had recently established.

The fire also affected residents' property that was located near the mosque.

Under the pretext of grazing their sheep, settlers regularly carry out attacks against residents in the community, including stealing and destroying their property, or directly assaulting them.

“Settlers from time to time poison the livestock raised by Palestinians here or deliberately trample them, knowing that livestock are our main source of livelihood,” Mlihat added.

The settlers also do not hesitate to shoot at livestock while they are grazing near the community, and they also closed all pastures, preventing Palestinians from being there.

“We demand the protection of the residents of the community and the rest of the Bedouin communities that are subjected to unprecedented attacks by settlers with the aim of seizing lands,” he said.

According to the report, the fire tore through the building, destroying it completely.

Wafa added that the group also torched a tractor.

These practices come in conjunction with the Israeli Knesset’s vote to enact a draft law allowing settlers to own and purchase land in the West Bank, which allows for an unprecedented acceleration of the pace of settlement.

During the war on Gaza, settlers established seven new settlement outposts in Area B of the West Bank, which the Palestinians considered a dangerous escalation that would lead to the seizure of more lands.

The Palestinian foreign ministry on Sunday said “settler militias and their terrorist elements” were increasingly attacking Palestinian citizens and their properties.

In a statement, it condemned the surging “aggression of the occupation and its settlers” in the occupied West Bank and called on the international community to intervene.

“The foreign ministry views with great concern the colonial projects that fuel this ongoing aggression and holds the Israeli government fully and directly responsible for its repercussions on the efforts made to establish calm, ceasefire, and end the cycle of wars,” it said.

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