Two Israeli women died this Friday in a armed attack in the occupied West Bank after Israeli shelling of the Gaza Strip and southern Lebanon, in full escalation of violence in the region. The tension escalated this week after the intervention of the Israeli police on Wednesday in the Al Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem, coinciding with the Muslim holidays of Ramadan and the Jewish Passover.
Dozens of rockets were fired at Israel on Thursday, and this Friday morning the Israeli army responded with attacks in Lebanon and the Gaza Strip against positions of the Palestinian Hamas movement.
This Friday in the West Bank two Israeli sisters in their twenties were killed and their mother wounded in a shooting attack on their vehicle, reported the Magen David Adom, the Israeli equivalent of the Red Cross.
The army specified that his vehicle was attacked at the Hamra crossingin the northern Jordan River Valley, in the West Bank, a Palestinian territory occupied by Israel since 1967.
This attack comes just hours after the Israeli army launched shelling attacks on Gaza and Lebanon against “terrorist infrastructures belonging to Hamas.” In Tyre, in southern Lebanon, AFP journalists heard loud explosions.
“At least two shells landed near the camp” of Palestinian refugees from Rashidieh, refugee Abu Ahmad told AFP.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had warned of a strong reaction. “We will hit our enemies and we will make them pay the price of each aggression,” he said.
On Thursday, on Passover day, around thirty rockets were fired at Israel from Lebanon, in the biggest escalation since 2006 on the border between these two countries, which are technically still at war after several conflicts.
Since April 2022, no rockets have been launched from Lebanon towards Israel, who then also carried out attacks against his neighbor. However, this is the most serious incident since the 2006 war against Hezbollah.
the palestinian movement Hamas condemned “in the strongest possible terms the appalling Israeli aggression against the besieged Gaza Strip and Lebanon.” The Gaza Ministry of Health reported “damage” to the Al Dorra Children’s Hospital following Israeli shelling, which it described as “unacceptable.”
Hamas and Islamic Jihad informed Egypt — which usually acts as a mediator — on Friday that “the Palestinian factions are going to continue firing rockets if Israel continues its attacks and bombings,” sources from these groups told AFP. in Gaza.
The Lebanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs stated that His country wants to preserve calm in the southern zone and called on the international community to “put pressure on Israel to stop the escalation”.
The head of the United Nations Interim Force (UNIFIL), General Aroldo Lázaro, spoke with authorities from both Israel and Lebanon and assured in a statement that “both sides have said they do not want war.”
In addition, the UK called for “all parties” to “de-escalate”. For its part, France reiterated its “unwavering commitment to the security of Israel and the stability and sovereignty of Lebanon.”
These episodes occur after the violent eviction of Palestinian faithful in the Al Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem, which left 350 detainees according to the police and 37 injured according to the Red Crescent.
The temple is located on the Esplanade of the Mosques, the third holy place in Islam and located in turn in East Jerusalem, the Palestinian sector of the city occupied and annexed by Israel since 1967. The complex is erected on top of the Temple Mount, considered the holiest place for Judaism.
Israel received numerous international condemnations, including from the UN, whose Secretary General António Guterres once again called on “all actors” for “maximum restraint”.