Israeli civilians fatally shot two Palestinians in the West Bank on Monday, according to Israeli and Palestinian officials, as tension continued to rise in the Israeli-occupied territories.
The Palestinian Authority’s health ministry identified the two men as Abdelrahman Bani Fadel, 30, and Mohammad Bani Jama, 21. The circumstances of their deaths near the city of Aqraba remained unclear.
The Israeli military said the two men were killed during a “violent exchange” between Israeli civilians and Palestinians following a report of a Palestinian attacking an Israeli shepherd. An initial investigation showed that the gunfire “did not originate” from Israeli soldiers, the army said.
The two Palestinians appeared to have been shot by Israeli civilians at the scene, said an Israeli security official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the investigation was still ongoing.
The killings fueled fears that the West Bank could become another front for a country already in its seventh month of war on the Gaza Strip.
About 500,000 Israeli settlers in the West Bank live alongside about 2.7 million Palestinians under Israeli military occupation. Since the start of the war on October 7, more than 400 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli forces there and in East Jerusalem, according to the United Nations.
In recent days, a new wave of violence has swept the West Bank.
On Friday, a 14-year-old Israeli teenager went missing, prompting Israeli settlers to riot in a Palestinian village, Al Mughayir. Jihad Abu Aliyah, a 25-year-old resident, was fatally shot during a mob attack, according to the village’s mayor, Amin Abu Aliyah.
The teenager, Binyamin Achimair, was found dead on Saturday after an intensive search. Israeli officials said he had been killed in a terrorist attack and vowed to track down the perpetrators. In response, Israeli settlers, some of them armed, carried out a series of mob attacks on Palestinian towns, setting houses and cars on fire, according to Palestinian witnesses.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called on Israelis to allow security forces to hunt down Mr. Atzimayr’s killers, but did not denounce mob attacks on Palestinians. Human rights groups have long charged that Israel turns a blind eye to settler violence and rarely brings perpetrators to justice.
In plan Distributed on Sunday by Yesh Din, an Israeli rights group that monitors violence by Jewish extremists in the West Bank, hooded figures can be seen setting fire to a car while Israeli soldiers watch nearby without intervening.
Matthew Miller, the State Department spokesman, condemned Mr. Atchimire’s killing in a statement on Monday. But he also said Washington was “increasingly concerned about the violence against Palestinian civilians and their property that followed in the West Bank after Achimair’s disappearance.”
“We strongly condemn these killings and our thoughts are with their loved ones,” Mr Miller said. “The violence must stop. Civilians are never legitimate targets.”
