Correspondent in Jerusalem
This is a scene that fans of the Israeli series “Fauda” are used to seeing.
Except that, this time, the characters disguised as Palestinians and advancing, weapons in hand, in the corridors of the Ibn Sina hospital in Jenin, are not actors.
They are members of a special Israeli unit, specializing in infiltrations into the heart of Palestinian towns and whose operation was captured Monday evening by the hospital's video surveillance system, a place nevertheless protected by international humanitarian law.
The attack ended with the death of three young Palestinians.
They would have been executed in their beds, in silence.
Images posted on social media show pillows and hospital beds covered in blood like those where they were killed.
On Tuesday morning, the three young men were buried in the Jenin cemetery dedicated to the
“martyrs”
of the
“resistance to the occupation”
by a crowd chanting
“Allah Akbar”.
Explosive context
The Israeli army claims that these three young men made up a
“Hamas terrorist cell hidden inside the hospital”.
Taking advantage of the protection enjoyed by the hospital, the head of the cell, Mohamed Jalamneh, 27,
“planned a raid inspired by the massacres of October 7
,” says the army.
According to Israeli security services, this man was in contact with a Hamas command center abroad and had provided weapons and ammunition to
“terrorists”
to organize an attack.
Tuesday morning, a press release from the Jenin section of the Al Qassam brigades, the armed wing of Hamas, deplored the death of these
"three sons of the Palestinian people"
among whom, affirms the organization,
"one of the founders of the brigade of Jenin.”
This operation occurs in a particularly explosive context in the West Bank.
During the night from Monday to Tuesday, actions by the Israeli army took place in Jenin, Nablus and Tulkarem.
Located in the north of this territory occupied since 1967 by the Israeli army, the three towns are at the heart of the intifada which has been brewing for months in the West Bank.
Since the terrorist attack of October 7 and the long war that followed, it has gained in intensity.
On Tuesday, five Palestinians were killed by the Israeli army.
According to the United Nations, they died during clashes in Jenin, but also in villages near Hebron, Bethlehem and Ramallah.
Since October 7, 367 Palestinians in the West Bank have been killed in similar conditions.
Israeli security services fear that a large-scale attack will be committed in the very heart of the country.
On Tuesday in Haifa, a man drove his car toward soldiers guarding a military base, then got out with an ax in his hand.
He is a 27-year-old Palestinian from Israel who was seriously injured by the soldiers.
In mid-January, in Ra'anana, near Tel Aviv, two Palestinians who came illegally from Hebron carried out a double attack, leaving one dead and 17 injured.
The rocket fire, of an intensity unaccustomed for several weeks, which targeted towns in central Israel late Tuesday afternoon was a reminder that the war in the Gaza Strip is far from over. .
But for Israelis, the threat could materialize at any moment in an attack around the corner.