Israeli troops leave West Bank's Jenin as Gaza talks stall
Israeli forces withdrew after a deadly 10-day raid in a flashpoint city in the occupied West Bank Friday, witnesses said, as key ally Germany warned against treating the territory like Gaza.
There was no official confirmation that Israel's military had withdrawn from Jenin, a bastion of Palestinian armed groups, but AFP journalists reported residents returning home.
The pull-out came with Israel at loggerheads with its main ally the United States over talks aimed at forging a truce in the Gaza war, now nearly in its 12th month.
On Thursday, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken urged both Israel and Hamas to finalise a truce deal, saying: "I think based on what I've seen, 90 percent is agreed."
But Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu denied this in an interview with Fox News, saying: "It's not close."
Washington and fellow mediators Qatar and Egypt have been pushing a proposal to bridge gaps between both sides.
Netanyahu insists on a military presence on the border between Gaza and Egypt along the so-called Philadelphi Corridor.
Hamas is demanding a complete Israeli withdrawal, saying it agreed months ago to a proposal outlined by US President Joe Biden.
- 'No solution' -
In Israel on Friday, German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock said that "a purely military approach is no solution to the situation in Gaza", after the recovery of six dead hostages announced on Sunday.
Before also visiting Ramallah, she warned against calls by hardline right-wing members of Israel's cabinet for the military to take a similar approach to the West Bank as in Gaza.
"When members of the Israeli government themselves call for the same approach in the West Bank as in Gaza, that is precisely what acutely endangers Israel's security," Baerbock told reporters.
Her Israeli counterpart Israel Katz said Iran wanted to "arm" the West Bank "just like" Gaza.
"Nobody wants a deal for the hostages' release and a ceasefire more than Israel", he added, and blamed Hamas.
In Nablus, Rafidia hospital director Fouad Nafaa said a US citizen, an activist in her mid-20s, died from a "gunshot in the head" after being admitted Friday.
The official Wafa Palestinian news agency said she was an activist in a campaign to protect farmers from Israeli settler violence.
Hamas's October 7 attack on Israel resulted in the deaths of 1,205 people, mostly civilians including some hostages killed in captivity, according to official Israeli figures.
Of 251 hostages seized by Palestinian militants during the attack, 97 remain in Gaza including 33 the Israeli military says are dead. Scores were released during a one-week truce in November.
Israel's retaliatory offensive in Gaza has so far killed at least 40,878 people, according to the health ministry in the Hamas-run territory.
Most of the dead are women and children, according to the UN rights office.
Netanyahu is under increasing pressure after the six hostages' bodies were retrieved from Gaza.
Critics have blamed him for their deaths, saying he refused to make necessary concessions to strike a ceasefire deal.
- Roads churned up -
In the West Bank, which Israel occupied in 1967, the military launched coordinated raids on August 28 with soldiers supported by armoured vehicles and bulldozers.
Palestinian health ministry figures put the death toll for the Israeli incursion at 36.
The funerals took place Friday of several people killed in the raid.
Many homes in Jenin refugee camp were damaged or destroyed by Israeli bulldozers which also churned up road surfaces.
One resident told AFP his home had been raided by soldiers.
"Thank God (the children) left the day before. They went to stay with our neighbours," said Aziz Taleb, a 48-year-old father of seven.
During the operation, Israeli forces killed 14 militants and arrested 30 suspects, Israel's military said. One soldier was killed in Jenin.
Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad have said at least 14 of the dead were militants.
- Polio vaccinations -
Itamar Ben-Gvir, Israel's far-right national security minister, posted on X Friday that he had asked Netanyahu to make the defeat of Hamas "and other terrorist organisations" in the West Bank one of the aims of the war in Gaza.
Israel's Gaza bombardment has left it in ruins, with infrastructure destruction blamed for the spread of disease.
The humanitarian crisis has led to Gaza's first polio case in 25 years, prompting a massive vaccination drive with localised "humanitarian pauses" in fighting.
The World Health Organization said Thursday nearly 200,000 children in central Gaza have received a first vaccine dose, as a second stage began in the south.
Gaza's health ministry and a spokeswoman from the UN agency for Palestinian refugees said Friday medical teams vaccinated 161,188 children on the first day of the second phase.
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