Troops kill 2 Palestinians
June 22, 2014
The Israeli army announced that, during their hunt for three teens missing since June 12, troops fired warning shots early Sunday before killing 27-year-old Ahmed Fahnawi in the Nablus area.
Fahnawi was said to have approached soldiers "in a threatening manner" on his way to mosque for morning prayers. Members of Fahnawi's family told the news agency AFP that the man suffered from mental health problems.
Elsewhere, the Palestinian hospital official Ahmed Bitawi said Israeli fire had killed 30-year-old Mohammed Tarifi in the city of Ramallah. Soldiers also injured five Palestinians in protests early Sunday.
Israeli forces arrived Sunday in Nablus and Ramallah to conduct further arrests as part of their operation to locate the teenagers, whom officials believe were abducted by the Islamist political faction Hamas. A spokesman told AFP that, after taking at least 10 people into custody Saturday, the army had arrested six more suspects overnight, bringing the total number of Palestinians held since the beginning of the operation to about 340, about two-thirds of them Hamas members.
Extensive hunt
Israeli officials say the military has searched some 1,350 sites in the West Bank. Prior to the two deaths on Sunday, the army had killed three Palestinians in its hunt.
The army has a twofold operation in the West Bank: to find Gil-Ad Shaer and US-Israeli national Naftali Fraenkel, both aged 16, and Eyal Yifrah, 19, and to deal a substantial blow to Hamas, which has not claimed any involvement in the disappearances. Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas has condemned the suspected kidnappings but has also said the Israeli military sweep amounts to collective punishment.
Tensions between Israeli and Palestinian officials have grown since Abbas formed a unity government with Hamas, the party democratically elected to locally lead the Gaza Strip. That move has received a mixed response from the international community, and Israeli officials firmly reject it.
Before dawn, the military also carried out air strikes on four sites in the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip after militants launched three rockets from the territory into Israel on Saturday. Neither side has reported casualties from the irregulars' rocket fire or the Israeli army's missile strikes.
mkg/rc(Reuters, AFP, dpa, AP)