Israel launches full-blown military operation in West Bank, killing at least 10 Hamas terrorists

Israel used helicopters and drones to help storm several occupied areas of the West Bank on Wednesday, killing at least 10 Hamas terrorists in the largest assault on the area in months.

The coordinated raids across four cities — including the Hamas strongholds of Tulkarm and Jenin — were a direct response to rising attacks posing an “immediate threat” to civilians, according to Israeli military spokesperson Lieutenant Colonel Nadav Shoshani.

Israeli troops also surrounded Jenin and blocked entry to its hospitals, to stop terrorists from using them as hideouts as they have in Gaza.

The 10 killed were all terrorists, including three killed in an airstrike in Tulkarem and another four in an airstrike in Al-Faraa — with at least five other terrorists also arrested during heavy gun battles, Shoshani said

Hamas also confirmed those killed in the raids were its militant members. It identified two killed in Jenin as Qassam Jabarin, 25, and Asem Balout, 39.

A separate Israeli strike in the area of the Syrian-Lebanese border also killed Faris Qasim, a “significant terrorist” in the Islamic Jihad terrorist organization, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said.

“Qasim was responsible for the development of the Islamic Jihad’s operational plans in Syria and Lebanon,” the IDF wrote on X.

“He had a central role in the recruitment of Palestinian terrorists into the Hezbollah terrorist organization responsible for carrying out terrorist attacks from Lebanon against the State of Israel.”

The West Bank raids were a response to ongoing attacks there in the nearly 11-month war since Oct. 7, when Hamas stormed Israel to slaughter more than 1,200 people and take another 250 hostage.

Since then, there have been over 150 attacks — involving shooting or explosives — in Tulkarm and Jenin alone, Shoshani said.

“This terror threat in this area is not new, it hasn’t started yesterday and it’s not going to end tomorrow,” he told reporters during a briefing Wednesday.

During the raids, Israeli forces “met real-time fire exchanged with terrorists engaging in battle” — and confiscated weapons including M-16s, the IDF said on X. 

“Additionally, the forces exposed and dismantled explosives that were planted under the roads in the area and were intended to be detonated in attacks against the security forces operating in the area,” the IDF wrote. 

Israeli forces blocked both entry and exit points to hospitals in Jenin to stop them being used as a hideout for terrorists.

“We must deal with the threat just as we deal with the terrorist infrastructure in Gaza,” Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz wrote on X. 

“This is a war in every respect, and we must win it.”

Shoshani said there was no plan to evacuate civilians.

Hamas responded by calling on Palestinians in the West Bank to “join the sacred battle of our people” and fight back against Israel’s efforts to expand the war in Gaza.

Nabil Abu Rudeineh, a spokesperson for Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, condemned the raids as a “serious escalation” and called on the US to intervene, according to the official Palestinian news agency. 

Israel captured the West Bank, Gaza and east Jerusalem in the 1967 Mideast war, though the Palestinians want all three to form a future state.

While some 500,000 Jewish settlers live in the West Bank under Israeli military rule, so do 3 million Palestinians. 

Israeli strikes in Gaza overnight also killed at least 16 people, including five women and three children.

Violence has raged in the West Bank ever since Hamas launched its unprecedented Oct. 7 attack on Israel, killing some 1,200 people and taking another 250 hostages. 

The US, Qatar and Egypt have spent months trying to broker a ceasefire deal that would see the release of the remaining hostages.

While the US remains optimistic a deal can be made, talks have repeatedly stalled as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed “total victory” over Hamas and the terrorist group demanded a lasting ceasefire and full withdrawal from the territory.

With Post wires