Israeli raids kill two Palestinians in West Bank: Red Crescent

At least two Palestinians were killed Sunday during Israeli army raids in the West Bank, the Red Crescent said, as violence surges in the occupied territory in tandem with the Israel-Hamas war.

According to the Palestinian Red Crescent, a 45-year-old man was killed in Jenin, a stronghold of armed groups in the northern West Bank, and another person was killed in Dheisheh refugee camp near Bethlehem further south.

Contacted by AFP, the Israeli army did not immediately comment.

The Red Crescent said that overall, Israeli forces carried out at least five overnight operations in towns and refugee camps across the West Bank, which Israel has occupied since 1967.

Israeli army raids targeting suspected Palestinian militants in the West Bank have surged since Hamas launched its deadly October 7 attacks on southern Israel from the Gaza Strip, as has Israeli settler violence against Palestinians.

The Palestinian health ministry in Ramallah says Israeli forces and settlers have killed more than 200 Palestinians in the West Bank since the start of the Israel-Hamas war.

Hamas gunmen on October 7 Hamas surged out of Gaza and, according to Israeli officials, killed 1,200 people -- mostly civilians -- and seized around 240 hostages.

In retaliation, Israel launched bombardments and a ground offensive against the Islamist movement in Gaza, where the Hamas government says at least 12,300 people, also mostly civilians, have been killed.

In the northern West Bank on Saturday, five fighters in the armed wing of Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas's Fatah movement were killed in a rare Israeli airstrike on Balata refugee camp, the Palestinian Red Crescent and Fatah sources said.

On Sunday, an AFP photographer saw Israeli troops searching Nablus's Balata camp.