\n Israeli forces killed three Palestinian fighters Monday in a raid on a refugee camp in the occupied West Bank, in what the army described as an operation targeting \"terrorist\" suspects.\n<\/p>\n
\n In a statement, the Palestinian health ministry identified the three men killed in Balata camp in Nablus as Muhammad Abu Zaytoun, 32, Fathi Abu Rizk, 30, and Abdullah Abu Hamdan, 24.\n<\/p>\n
\n The Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades, the armed wing of Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas's Fatah party, said in a statement that the three were among the group's \"fighters\".\n<\/p>\n
\n The group's emblem was wrapped around the foreheads of the men in a morgue, while their bodies were shrouded in the Palestinian flag.\n<\/p>\n
\n The Israeli army said it had shot several fighters when a gun battle erupted during a \"counterterrorism\" operation.\n<\/p>\n
\n During the operation, \"armed suspects fired at the soldiers, who responded with live fire. Hits were identified,\" it said.\n<\/p>\n
\n The army added in a statement that it \"apprehended three wanted individuals suspected of involvement in terrorist activity\", and that weapons and ammunition were seized.\n<\/p>\n
\n Palestinian presidency spokesman Nabil Abu Rudeineh described the killings as a \"veritable massacre\" and charged that repeated Israeli raids and attacks by settlers constituted a \"major war crime and a collective punishment\".\n<\/p>\n
\n He said \"silence\" from the United States had emboldened Israelis to escalate attacks, calling on Washington to \"immediately intervene to stop the Israeli madness that will drag the region toward explosion\".\n<\/p>\n
\n Israel has occupied the West Bank since the 1967 Six-Day War and its forces regularly launch incursions into Palestinian cities, which are nominally under the control of Abbas's Palestinian Authority.\n<\/p>\n
\n Deadly military operations have surged in recent months across the Palestinian territory.\n<\/p>\n
\n - Escalating violence -\n<\/p>\n
\n Witnesses told AFP that Israeli forces raided several houses in the camp overnight in search of people wanted by the army.\n<\/p>\n
\n Gunfire and loud explosions rocked the camp, the witnesses said, adding that a house was demolished.\n<\/p>\n
\n Israel's army, meanwhile, said it had \"located in one of the residences an explosives manufacturing site\" and detonated it.\n<\/p>\n
\n Following the raid, Palestinians inspected the rubble of a damaged building and salvaged belongings.\n<\/p>\n
\n The Hamas militant group, which rules the blockaded Gaza Strip, described those killed as \"freedom fighters\".\n<\/p>\n
\n \"Hamas reiterates that resisting the (Israeli) occupation is a legitimate right for the Palestinian people in their quest for freedom,\" the group said in a statement.\n<\/p>\n
\n Densely-populated Balata is home to some 27,000 people, making it the largest camp in the West Bank, according to the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA).\n<\/p>\n
\n The Israeli army also reported clashes in an operation in Jenin, north of Nablus, where it said suspects hurled explosive devices and fired at the soldiers.\n<\/p>\n
\n The troops \"responded with live fire\" and in two cases \"a hit was identified\", the statement said.\n<\/p>\n
\n Israeli forces arrested three suspects in Jenin and seven others in other parts of the West Bank, it added.\n<\/p>\n
\n The latest raids come just over a week into a fragile Gaza ceasefire after a five-day cross-border conflict between Israel and the Islamic Jihad militant group.\n<\/p>\n
\n Since the start of the year, at least 153 Palestinians, 20 Israelis, a Ukrainian and an Italian have been killed in violence linked to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, according to an AFP tally compiled from official sources from both sides.\n<\/p>\n
\n They include, on the Palestinian side, combatants and civilians, and on the Israeli side mostly civilians and three members of the Arab minority.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Israeli forces killed three Palestinian fighters Monday in a raid on a refugee camp in the occupied West Bank, in what the army described as an operation targeting \"terrorist\" suspects. In a statement, the Palestinian health ministry identified the three men killed in Balata camp in Nablus as Muhammad Abu Zaytoun, 32, Fathi Abu Rizk, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":60,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[553],"tags":[],"ji_location":[],"class_list":["post-117067","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-live-feed"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n