Israeli forces raided a refugee camp in the volatile West Bank city of Jenin on Tuesday, killing at least six Palestinians, including a Hamas gunman suspected of shooting two brothers from a Jewish settlement near the village of Huwara last week.
Witnesses said fighting broke out after residents of the camp saw Israeli soldiers getting out of a furniture truck near a house on a hill overlooking the centre of the sprawling camp and fighters immediately opened fire.
In the ensuing gun battle, Israeli forces surrounded a house where the suspected gunman had barricaded himself with other fighters, and used shoulder-fired missiles against the building, a statement from the military said. As well as six dead, at least 16 Palestinians were wounded, while one member of the Israeli police force was wounded and three lightly hurt.
The military identified the gunman as Abdel-Fattah Kharusha, a member of the Islamist group Hamas, who it said shot two Israelis while they sat in their car at a checkpoint near the Palestinian village of Huwara in the occupied West Bank on 26th February. It said his two sons had been arrested in a raid at the same time on the city of Nablus, another centre of militant activity.
According to statements by Hamas and Islamic Jihad, all those killed were gunmen from the militant groups Hamas, Islamic Jihad and Fatah.
Read the article by Ali Sawafta in Sight Magazine