Palestinian homes attacked by Israeli settlers and soldiers in occupied West Bank

Israeli settlers attacked the homes of Palestinians in Kafr Ad-Dik at dawn today, Wafa has reported. The town is near the city of Salfit in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.

According to Mohammad Naji, the Mayor of Kafr Ad-Dik, the settlers smashed the windows of several Palestinian homes and closed the roads to local villagers. He added that the assaults by the settlers, who were, as usual, protected by the Israeli occupation forces, follows yesterday’s attacks when the Israeli authorities closed all the entrances to the villages and towns of the Salfit Governorate and set fire to vehicles and homes.

Violence by Israeli settlers against Palestinians and their property is commonplace in the occupied West Bank and is rarely punished by the occupation authorities. Such violence includes arson attacks on homes, farms and mosques, stone-throwing, uprooting of crops and olive trees and attacks on isolated homes.

Meanwhile, a substantial Israeli army unit broke into several Palestinian homes during a raid in the village of Orif, near Nablus. The head of Orif village council, Abed Al-Hamim Shehadeh, told Wafa that the Israeli soldiers broke into the homes of the two village residents who allegedly shot and killed four Israeli settlers yesterday at a petrol station adjacent to the settlement of Eli, between Ramallah and Nablus. All settlers and the settlements in which they live are illegal under international law.

The Palestinians, Muhammad Shehadeh and Khaled Sabah, were shot and killed by the soldiers, who took the measurements of their homes to prepare them for demolition. Such demolitions are carried out frequently by the Israeli occupation forces and are regarded as collective punishment by human rights groups. The imposition of collective punishment is akin to a war crime.

The attack on the settlers from Eli settlement came the day after six Palestinians were killed and dozens more were wounded in an Israeli military raid in Jenin. A seventh victim, 15-year-old Sadeel Ghassan Turkman, died of her wounds this morning.

Tensions have been running high across the occupied West Bank in recent months amid repeated Israeli raids into Palestinian towns.

The Palestinian Authority Ministry of Health has pointed out that 174 Palestinians have been killed by Israel in the occupied territories since the start of the year. That’s an average of just over one person killed every day since 1 January. At least 21 Israelis have been killed in separate incidents during the same period.