Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich called on the army to carry out a new military operation in the West Bank to restore what he called deterrence and security, coinciding with the occupation forces searching for the perpetrators of the Hawara operation that claimed the lives of two Israelis.
Smotrich added in a tweet on the “X” platform (formerly Twitter) that this should be at a time when work continues to strengthen infrastructure and settlement in the region.
These statements came after Palestinian gunmen opened fire, yesterday evening, Saturday, at the Al-Zaeem checkpoint of the Israeli occupation army, near occupied Jerusalem.
Two Israelis were also killed by gunfire in Hawara, near Nablus, in the northern West Bank, and the occupation forces sent military reinforcements to villages and towns south of Nablus, in search of the perpetrator of the operation.
The occupation forces closed the entrances to the village of Hawara, and launched a campaign of arrests, combing and raids in the villages of Urif, Madama and Beita.
Today, Sunday, the Israeli army announced that a settler was wounded by army fire near the village of Al-Laban Al-Sharqiya, between Nablus and Ramallah, as he was targeted by the occupation forces, as they thought he was a Palestinian.
The Palestinian Foreign Ministry condemns
For its part, the Palestinian Ministry of Foreign Affairs condemned “in the strongest terms” the attacks and assaults on the town of Hawara, Jerusalem and various areas in the West Bank.
In a press statement issued today, Sunday – and reported by the Palestinian Wafa Agency – it denounced “the incitement calls made by extremist settlers on social media, which again call for the erasure of Hawara.”
And she warned of the great danger of the return of the slogan “Erase Hawara”, and considered it a direct and public incitement to commit genocide against Palestinian citizens, and calls for deepening the crimes of ethnic cleansing not only on the hearing and sight of the Israeli government, but also with the support of ministers and officials in it.
She pointed out that the failure of the international community to take deterrent measures and penalties stipulated in international law against the perpetrators of these crimes encouraged extremist settlers and their terrorist associations and organizations to commit more crimes and reproduce the burning and erasure of Hawara.
The Palestinian Foreign Ministry held the Israeli government, headed by Benjamin Netanyahu, fully and directly responsible for settler violations and crimes against Palestinian citizens, their land, properties, homes, vehicles, and sanctities throughout the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem.
Confronting the occupation
In this context, the head of the Hamas movement abroad, Khaled Meshaal, called on Saturday evening to confront the Israeli occupation plan to displace the Palestinians from the West Bank.
The Palestinian “Ma’an” agency quoted Meshaal as saying in a videotaped speech during the 22nd Al-Aqsa Festival in the Jordanian governorate of Al-Karak, that “Benjamin Netanyahu’s government, which is the most extreme and most criminal in the history of the entity, is in a hurry to resolve the conflict in the West Bank, occupied Jerusalem and Al-Aqsa Mosque.” That is why the Zionists say that if you Palestinians have a homeland, it is in Jordan. This is what Smotrich said specifically in Paris, and this is the truth of the Zionist mentality.
The former head of the Hamas political bureau warned that “what is happening is not just settlement, but the plan is to displace the people of the West Bank to Jordan.”
In the conference, which came under the title “Al-Aqsa is but a belief,” Meshaal added that “the occupation wants to target all of our nation, and in the heart of it is Palestine and Jordan, and then they want to empty the West Bank of its people, and to resolve the battle over Jerusalem and its Judaization and political and religious control over this great city.” As well as resolving the battle over Al-Aqsa.
Khaled Meshaal pointed out that “Al-Aqsa Mosque is no longer in danger, but today it is in the heart of this danger, which is almost sacrilegious and intrusive, and is just steps away from demolition.”
Meshaal asked, “What is left for us if the land, Jerusalem and Al-Aqsa are lost? Are we waiting for remorse, or are we men of the stage? Rather, we are the nation of jihad, resistance and martyrdom, and this nation has always been in good faith since the dawn of history,” he said.
And he stressed that “the Palestinian resistance is in good faith, and the bet is in each of the Gaza Strip, the cities of the West Bank, and the 48 lands,” noting that “the Palestinian people are on the covenant,” and that the battle today is “a battle of honor, religion, Arabism, Islam, and destiny.”
