AL-MUGHAYYIR, West Bank — Israel‘s army said Saturday the body of a missing Israeli teen was found in the West Bank after he was killed in a “terrorist attack,” as violence escalated across the Israeli-occupied territory where tensions have simmered for months.
The disappearance of 14-year-old Binyamin Achimair sparked a large attack by Israeli settlers on a Palestinian village on Friday and Saturday. On Friday, one Palestinian man was killed and 25 others were wounded in the attack on the village of Mughayyir, Palestinian health officials said. Israeli troops on Saturday delayed the ambulance carrying 26-year-old’s body for several hours, witnesses said.
Dozens of settlers returned to the village’s outskirts on Saturday, burning two homes and several cars. The Palestinian Health Ministry said three people from the village were injured, one critically.
In the nearby village of Douma, Israeli settlers set fire to several homes, according to Wafa, the official Palestinian news agency. The Palestinian Red Crescent said six people were injured by gunfire but did not say who fired.
Tensions in the West Bank have been especially high since the outbreak of the Israel-Hamas war in nearby Gaza on Oct. 7. Israel declared war on Hamas after militants killed about 1,200 people in southern Israel and took 250 hostages. More than 33,000 Palestinians have been killed in Israel’s offensive since then, according to Gaza health officials.
Since the war began, Hamas has been trying to ignite other fronts, including in the West Bank, in hopes of exerting more pressure on Israel. Such efforts have largely failed, though more than 460 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli fire in the West Bank since Oct. 7, most in clashes sparked by army raids but some by vigilante settlers.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the killing of the Israeli teen.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu condemned the killing “We will get to the murderers and their helpers as we do to anyone who harms the citizens of the state of Israel,” he said in a statement issued by his office.
In 2014, the abduction and killing of three Israeli teens in the West Bank escalated tensions and eventually ignited a 50-day Israel-Hamas war in Gaza, at the time the deadliest round of fighting between the two sides.
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