Masked Israeli settlers attacked Palestinians and set fire to property in a pair of villages in the occupied West Bank on Tuesday before clashing with Israeli soldiers sent to break up their rampage, the Israeli military and Palestinian officials said.
“Four Palestinians were injured and evacuated for medical treatment,” the Israel Defense Forces said in a statement Tuesday. Security forces used “riot dispersal means” to break up the mob in the Beit Lid and Deir Sharaf villages “and apprehended several Israeli citizens,” the statement added.
After the masked individuals fled and regrouped close by near the Baron Industrial Zone, the IDF said civilians “attacked IDF soldiers who were operating in the area and caused damage to a military vehicle.”
The Palestinian Red Crescent said it treated three people who had been beaten with sticks and stones. Israeli police said four Israeli suspects were arrested and held for questioning.
The Palestinian economy ministry said in a statement that preliminary investigations had revealed the attackers had targeted warehouses belonging to a food production company “and smashed windows and other property.” Four trucks and two vehicles belonging to employees had been set on fire, the statement added.
Israeli President Isaac Herzog in a post on X condemned what he called the “shocking and serious” attacks. “Such violence against civilians and IDF soldiers crosses a red line and I strongly condemn it,” he wrote.
Settler violence has surged since the war in the Gaza Strip erupted just over two years ago. On Friday, the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said settlers staged at least 264 attacks on Palestinians in October — the highest monthly tally since the U.N. began tracking incidents in 2006.
Palestinians and human rights workers accuse the Israeli army and police of failing to halt attacks by settlers, which have intensified in recent weeks as Palestinians harvest their olive trees.
Several senior members of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government have close ties to West Bank settlers, including his ultranationalist National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, a hard-line settler leader who oversees the police.
News of the attacks came after the Palestinian branch of the Switzerland-based nongovernmental child rights organization Defense for Children International said in a statement that it had obtained documentation that showed a 13-year-old boy had died on Tuesday of tear gas inhalation.
Aysam Jihad Labib Naser was harvesting olives with his family on Oct. 11 in the north of the West Bank “when Israeli soldiers heavily bombarded the area with tear gas and fired several tear gas canisters.”
This had caused “him to choke severely and collapse,” the statement said. Although he was transferred to a nearby hospital, he remained in “critical condition in the cardiac intensive care unit until he died,” it added.
A spokesperson for the IDF said, “The details of the incident are under review by the relevant authorities.”
Elsewhere, the Zikim crossing in northern Gaza was opened on Wednesday to allow humanitarian aid trucks into the enclave, COGAT, the Israeli military’s arm that oversees aid flows, said in a statement.
U.N. aid agencies have been calling for the reopening of the crossing for more aid to flow into the devastated northern part of the enclave, especially after last month’s ceasefire between Israel and Hamas.
Herzog’s office confirmed Wednesday that he had received a letter from President Donald Trump urging him to consider granting a pardon to Netanyahu in his long-running corruption trial.
“While I absolutely respect the independence of the Israeli Justice System, and its requirements, I believe that this ‘case’ against Bibi, who has fought alongside me for a long time, including against the very tough adversary of Israel, Iran, is a political, unjustified prosecution,” Trump said, using Netanyahu’s nickname in the letter shared by Herzog’s office.
Trump has repeatedly asked for a pardon for his close ally. Netanyahu denies the charges and has pleaded not guilty.
NBC News has reached out to the White House for comment.
