Several Israelis have been wounded overnight after they entered the Palestinian West Bank city of Nablus to visit a tomb and came under fire, the Israeli military says.
The Israelis appeared to be headed on their own overnight to a flashpoint shrine in the city, where visits are usually coordinated with the military under tight security precautions.
After they came under fire, troops entered the city, which is under the jurisdiction of the Palestinian Authority and its security forces, to evacuate the Israelis, the military said.
Israelis are prohibited from entering the Palestinian-controlled areas, although some still do.
The military later said forces were exchanging fire with armed Palestinians in the city. It was not immediately clear if the events were connected.
Israel has been conducting near-daily raids in the occupied West Bank since March, driving up tensions in the area.
The raids were launched after a spate of deadly attacks against Israelis that killed 19 people. Dozens of Palestinians have been killed since the start of the year, many of them militants or people involved in clashes with Israeli forces, the military says. But civilians have also been killed.
Some Jews believe the biblical Joseph is buried in the Nablus tomb, while Muslims say a sheikh is buried there. The army escorts Jewish worshippers to the site, known to Jews as Joseph’s Tomb, several times a year, in coordination with Palestinian security forces.
Read the article in The West Australian (AAP).