Members of the Israeli forces disguised as doctors and patients attack a West Bank hospital

2024-01-30 11:37:54

Updated Tuesday, January 30, 2024 – 15:29

Israeli forces sent a commando disguised as medical personnel and civilians to a hospital in Jenn, in the occupied West Bank, on Tuesday to execute three men presented as “terrorists” with links to Hamas. Three Palestinian militiamen reportedly died.

In a surveillance video published by the Palestinian authorities on social networks, a dozen men and women equipped with weapons of war and disguised as medical personnel or civilians entered a care unit and pointed their weapons at those present. Some masked members of the commando carried a folded wheelchair or a baby seat.

It is the first time since 2015 that Israeli forces have launched this type of operation in a West Bank hospitalwhere tensions intensify against the backdrop of the war between Israel and the Palestinian Islamist movement in Gaza.

An AFP journalist saw the bodies of the three men, mourned by their families, inside the Avicenna hospital in Jenn, a stronghold of Palestinian armed groups. A stretcher, on which a pillow pierced by a bullet was stained with blood, left little doubt about the nature of the operation.

Beyond, a mattress contained traces of blood, some of which had splattered on the floor and walls.

In a joint statement, the Israeli army, internal security and police said that together they had “neutralized” Mohammad Jalamnah, a “Hamas terrorist”, as well as “two other terrorists”, Bassel and Ayman Ghazawi.

Hamas confirmed Jalamnah’s affiliation. And the Islamic Jihad, another Palestinian Islamist movement, claimed the affiliation of the two Ghazawi brothers. The funerals of the latter two were organized at the end of the morning.

“A group of members of the occupation forces dressed in civilian clothes entered and killed” the three men with weapons fitted with silencers, Dr. Naji Nazzal, medical director of the establishment, told AFP.

“The operation took place in the rehabilitation department on the third floor, where Bassel Ghazawi has been receiving treatment since October 25,” the doctor added, specifying that the man “could no longer move at all.”