February 18, 2025
Qassam Muaddi
Israel has killed 55 Palestinians after one month of its ongoing “Iron Wall” offensive in the West Bank. Killings, mass displacement, and uncertainty are the new normal.
Qassam Muaddi
Israel has killed 55 Palestinians after one month of its ongoing “Iron Wall” offensive in the West Bank. Killings, mass displacement, and uncertainty are the new normal.
Mourners carry the bodies of six Palestinians killed during an Israeli
air strike the previous day on Jenin’s refugee camp in the occupied West
Bank, on January 15, 2025. The Palestinian health ministry said on
January 14 that an Israeli air strike on the Jenin refugee camp killed
six people, including a teenager, with the Israeli military confirming
it carried out an attack in the area. (Wahaj Bani Moufleh /
Activestills)
The ongoing Israeli offensive on the West Bank, dubbed “Operation Iron Wall,” has claimed the lives of four more Palestinians over the past week, bringing the total number of Palestinians killed since January 21 to 55.
The offensive, which started in Jenin and expanded to the rest of the northern West Bank, including Tulkarem, Tubas, and their surrounding areas, is the largest Israeli offensive on Palestinian cities in the West Bank since the Second Intifada — over 22 years ago. Israel launched it immediately after the ceasefire deal in Gaza entered into force amidst calls from Israeli far-right politicians and media outlets to “transfer the war to the West Bank.”
The Israeli escalation in the West Bank also came after declarations by hardline Israeli Finance Minister, Bezalel Smotrich, who is in charge of the Israeli administration of the West Bank, that 2025 will be the year of Israel’s annexation of the West Bank. Smotrich remained in Netanyahu’s government despite opposing the ceasefire deal in Gaza. According to Israeli reports, the offensive in the West Bank was an appeasement made to Smotrich in exchange for refraining from resigning in protest over the ceasefire deal, which would have caused a collapse in Prime Minister Netanyahu’s governing coalition.
As Israel’s war minister, Israel Katz, has repeatedly stated that Israel will continue to expand the current offensive to the rest of the West Bank, the rising casualties and mass displacement of people from targeted areas have become a part of Palestinians’ daily life. This reality has increasingly become solidified into a new normal, seemingly in preparation for Israel’s impending annexation of the West Bank.
Four Palestinians killed in one week
On Wednesday, the Palestinian Civil Liaison Office, the Palestinian Authority’s body in charge of coordinating civilian affairs with the Israeli occupation, announced the death of three Palestinians by Israeli fire in the Nur Shams refugee camp in Tulkarem, where the Israeli offensive has been ongoing for 23 days. The martyrs were identified as Jihad Masharqa, 40, Khaled Amer, 23, and Ghassan Abu Abed, whose age was not specified. The Israeli army withheld the bodies of the three men, according to the Palestinian civil liaison.
On Friday, Israeli forces killed Adel Bishkar, 19, during a raid on the eastern part of the city of Nablus. The Palestinian Red Crescent Society said that Bishkar was hit by a live bullet in the chest during the raid and was transferred to the hospital, where he was later pronounced dead.
Last Wednesday, Israeli forces killed Abdallah Froukh, 19, in the town of Sa’ir near Hebron. Also on Wednesday, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) said that Israeli forces had used a health center belonging to the agency as a detention and interrogation center, during a raid on the refugee camp of al-Arroub, north of Hebron.
In Jenin, where the Israeli offensive started, the Jenin refugee camp’s Media Committee said on Friday that the Israeli army had forced 20,000 Palestinians to leave their homes. The number represents half of the Palestinians who have been forcibly displaced by Israel since the beginning of the “Iron Wall” offensive, which according to UNRWA is 40,000 Palestinians.
The Media Committee also said that Israeli forces had destroyed 470 structures in the camp, conducted 153 home raids, and launched 14 airstrikes. According to the Committee, Israeli forces continue to cut off water from 35% of Jenin city, including the refugee camp and four hospitals.
‘We are all impacted’
The impact of the mass displacement of Palestinians from the refugee camps has reached the rest of the communities surrounding the camps. In Tulkarem, the Israeli army forcibly displaced at least 3,000 Palestinians from the Tulkarem refugee camp, representing one-third of the camp’s population, before expanding irs campaign to the other refugee camp in the city, Nur Shams.
“The housing and aid of the displaced has become the single largest challenge that the city is facing,” Momen Hamed, member of the Jadayel Youth Association in Tulkarem working to assist displaced people from the camps, told Mondoweiss.
“We need to work round-the-clock to ensure housing for every displaced family, and to provide meals for thousands who lost their homes. Despite the 250 volunteers working with us, we are still shorthanded,” Hamed explained. “The problem is that the entire economy of the city has been hit. Commerce is almost dead and people can barely go to work because of the ongoing military assault by the occupation. As a result, people have fewer resources to help assist the displaced, and our job as civil society becomes much harder.”
The Israeli offensive has paralyzed daily life in the rest of the West Bank, as Israeli forces have imposed 900 checkpoints and road barriers, cutting the West Bank’s Palestinian population into some 300 separated areas. Checkpoint closures have become a daily routine in hundreds of locations across the West Bank, accompanied by long waiting lines, detailed searches, physical aggression, and arrests.
“The occupation is imposing a localized and fragmented reality, to the point that if the occupation army is raiding a neighborhood just ten minutes away, we would feel that it’s far away,” Nisreen Ghazal, a resident of Nablus and business owner in the city, told Mondoweiss. “Last Sunday, when the occupation raided Nablus, it all happened 500 meters away from where my business is located, but the area was completely sealed off, and life in my part of the city was continuing as normal.”
“However, we are all impacted,” she said. “I, for example, run a kitchen and I teach cooking, and many of my students who come from outside of the city couldn’t come that day. Before this current offensive, we lived our lives quite normally, except when there was a raid in the city. Now, we are constantly having to catch up to where the raids are happening and what checkpoints are open or closed. We spend more time doing that than living our lives,” she added.
Simultaneously, Israeli settlers continued their attacks on Palestinian rural communities in the West Bank. On Monday morning alone, groups of Israeli settlers attacked three Palestinian villages in the Nablus governorate — Jourish, Aqraba, and Duma.
In Jourish, Palestinians reported that settlers stormed the village and threw rocks at houses, breaking several windows. No casualties were reported.
In Aqraba, settlers attacked a Palestinian farmer, beat him, and stole a number of sheep that he was herding, according to local reports. In Duma, settlers damaged a chicken barn and broke the windows of a house.
According to the ‘Palestinian Wall and Settlements Resistance Commission’, the official Palestinian Authority branch that monitors Israeli settlement and land grab activity, Israeli settlers carried out 375 attacks on Palestinian communities during January alone. These included armed attacks, land grabs, physical aggressions and destruction of crops and property.
Last week, a report by the Bethlehem-based Badil Center for Refugee Rights said that the aim of the current Israeli offensive in the West Bank was to “dismantle the refugee camps” in the West Bank and “normalize Israeli presence” by “establishing a new status quo in the West Bank through invasions and raids that include extensive destruction and willful killing” — with the purpose of “accelerat[ing[ full Israeli colonial domination.”
Israeli forces have killed 2,225 Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza since the beginning of the year. Since October 7, 2023, Israel has killed 911 Palestinians in the West Bank.
The offensive, which started in Jenin and expanded to the rest of the northern West Bank, including Tulkarem, Tubas, and their surrounding areas, is the largest Israeli offensive on Palestinian cities in the West Bank since the Second Intifada — over 22 years ago. Israel launched it immediately after the ceasefire deal in Gaza entered into force amidst calls from Israeli far-right politicians and media outlets to “transfer the war to the West Bank.”
The Israeli escalation in the West Bank also came after declarations by hardline Israeli Finance Minister, Bezalel Smotrich, who is in charge of the Israeli administration of the West Bank, that 2025 will be the year of Israel’s annexation of the West Bank. Smotrich remained in Netanyahu’s government despite opposing the ceasefire deal in Gaza. According to Israeli reports, the offensive in the West Bank was an appeasement made to Smotrich in exchange for refraining from resigning in protest over the ceasefire deal, which would have caused a collapse in Prime Minister Netanyahu’s governing coalition.
As Israel’s war minister, Israel Katz, has repeatedly stated that Israel will continue to expand the current offensive to the rest of the West Bank, the rising casualties and mass displacement of people from targeted areas have become a part of Palestinians’ daily life. This reality has increasingly become solidified into a new normal, seemingly in preparation for Israel’s impending annexation of the West Bank.
Four Palestinians killed in one week
On Wednesday, the Palestinian Civil Liaison Office, the Palestinian Authority’s body in charge of coordinating civilian affairs with the Israeli occupation, announced the death of three Palestinians by Israeli fire in the Nur Shams refugee camp in Tulkarem, where the Israeli offensive has been ongoing for 23 days. The martyrs were identified as Jihad Masharqa, 40, Khaled Amer, 23, and Ghassan Abu Abed, whose age was not specified. The Israeli army withheld the bodies of the three men, according to the Palestinian civil liaison.
On Friday, Israeli forces killed Adel Bishkar, 19, during a raid on the eastern part of the city of Nablus. The Palestinian Red Crescent Society said that Bishkar was hit by a live bullet in the chest during the raid and was transferred to the hospital, where he was later pronounced dead.
Last Wednesday, Israeli forces killed Abdallah Froukh, 19, in the town of Sa’ir near Hebron. Also on Wednesday, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) said that Israeli forces had used a health center belonging to the agency as a detention and interrogation center, during a raid on the refugee camp of al-Arroub, north of Hebron.
In Jenin, where the Israeli offensive started, the Jenin refugee camp’s Media Committee said on Friday that the Israeli army had forced 20,000 Palestinians to leave their homes. The number represents half of the Palestinians who have been forcibly displaced by Israel since the beginning of the “Iron Wall” offensive, which according to UNRWA is 40,000 Palestinians.
The Media Committee also said that Israeli forces had destroyed 470 structures in the camp, conducted 153 home raids, and launched 14 airstrikes. According to the Committee, Israeli forces continue to cut off water from 35% of Jenin city, including the refugee camp and four hospitals.
‘We are all impacted’
The impact of the mass displacement of Palestinians from the refugee camps has reached the rest of the communities surrounding the camps. In Tulkarem, the Israeli army forcibly displaced at least 3,000 Palestinians from the Tulkarem refugee camp, representing one-third of the camp’s population, before expanding irs campaign to the other refugee camp in the city, Nur Shams.
“The housing and aid of the displaced has become the single largest challenge that the city is facing,” Momen Hamed, member of the Jadayel Youth Association in Tulkarem working to assist displaced people from the camps, told Mondoweiss.
“We need to work round-the-clock to ensure housing for every displaced family, and to provide meals for thousands who lost their homes. Despite the 250 volunteers working with us, we are still shorthanded,” Hamed explained. “The problem is that the entire economy of the city has been hit. Commerce is almost dead and people can barely go to work because of the ongoing military assault by the occupation. As a result, people have fewer resources to help assist the displaced, and our job as civil society becomes much harder.”
The Israeli offensive has paralyzed daily life in the rest of the West Bank, as Israeli forces have imposed 900 checkpoints and road barriers, cutting the West Bank’s Palestinian population into some 300 separated areas. Checkpoint closures have become a daily routine in hundreds of locations across the West Bank, accompanied by long waiting lines, detailed searches, physical aggression, and arrests.
“The occupation is imposing a localized and fragmented reality, to the point that if the occupation army is raiding a neighborhood just ten minutes away, we would feel that it’s far away,” Nisreen Ghazal, a resident of Nablus and business owner in the city, told Mondoweiss. “Last Sunday, when the occupation raided Nablus, it all happened 500 meters away from where my business is located, but the area was completely sealed off, and life in my part of the city was continuing as normal.”
“However, we are all impacted,” she said. “I, for example, run a kitchen and I teach cooking, and many of my students who come from outside of the city couldn’t come that day. Before this current offensive, we lived our lives quite normally, except when there was a raid in the city. Now, we are constantly having to catch up to where the raids are happening and what checkpoints are open or closed. We spend more time doing that than living our lives,” she added.
Simultaneously, Israeli settlers continued their attacks on Palestinian rural communities in the West Bank. On Monday morning alone, groups of Israeli settlers attacked three Palestinian villages in the Nablus governorate — Jourish, Aqraba, and Duma.
In Jourish, Palestinians reported that settlers stormed the village and threw rocks at houses, breaking several windows. No casualties were reported.
In Aqraba, settlers attacked a Palestinian farmer, beat him, and stole a number of sheep that he was herding, according to local reports. In Duma, settlers damaged a chicken barn and broke the windows of a house.
According to the ‘Palestinian Wall and Settlements Resistance Commission’, the official Palestinian Authority branch that monitors Israeli settlement and land grab activity, Israeli settlers carried out 375 attacks on Palestinian communities during January alone. These included armed attacks, land grabs, physical aggressions and destruction of crops and property.
Last week, a report by the Bethlehem-based Badil Center for Refugee Rights said that the aim of the current Israeli offensive in the West Bank was to “dismantle the refugee camps” in the West Bank and “normalize Israeli presence” by “establishing a new status quo in the West Bank through invasions and raids that include extensive destruction and willful killing” — with the purpose of “accelerat[ing[ full Israeli colonial domination.”
Israeli forces have killed 2,225 Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza since the beginning of the year. Since October 7, 2023, Israel has killed 911 Palestinians in the West Bank.
No comments:
Post a Comment