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A Palestinian man inspects the damage at the site of an Israeli air strike in Tul Karm in the West Bank on Friday.Credit: Raneen Sawafta/Reuters. Published by Haaretz

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by IMEMC New
Oct 4, 2024

On Thursday night, the Israeli army assassinated eighteen citizens and injured more than twenty, including children and elders, in an airstrike on a popular café in Tulkarem refugee camp, in Tulkarem city, in the northwestern part of the occupied West Bank.

An Israeli aircraft fired at least one missile at a popular café in the Hamam neighborhood of Tulkarem refugee camp while dozens of citizens were there, resulting in the deaths of 18 citizens and injuries to at least twenty, the Palestinian Ministry of Health has confirmed.

Civil defense and ambulance vehicles rushed to the scene, transporting the slain and injured to Thabet Thabet Governmental Hospital in Tulkarem.

Volunteer paramedic at the Palestinian Red Crescent Society (PRCS), Diala Hadaida, said: “We witnessed difficult scenes after the bombing, with the remains of children and elderly people scattered and hanging on power lines, in addition to several Palestinians being trapped under the rubble.”

Local sources reported that civil defense and ambulance teams are working to rescue several citizens from under the rubble.

Tulkarem Governor Mustafa Taqatqa stated that the “brutal massacre in Tulkarem refugee camp, targeting a popular café in the camp by a warplane, adds to a long series of crimes targeting our Palestinian people everywhere.”

Taqatqa confirmed that Prime Minister Mohammad Mustafa is following up with all relevant authorities, including medical teams, ambulance and emergency teams of the Red Crescent, civil defense, and all related parties to address the aftermath of this crime.

Taqatqa pointed out that this crime will not undermine the determination of Tulkarem Governorate and the free will of the Palestinian people to end the occupation and establish the independent Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital.

He called on international and human rights institutions to take immediate and urgent action to stop these war crimes, which flagrantly disregard all international treaties, human rights laws, and international humanitarian law, with their insistence on committing such crimes.

Faisal Salama, head of the Popular Committee for Tulkarem Camp, described what happened in Tulkarem Camp as a series of criminal acts and massacres committed against the people, carried out by warplanes targeting a residential neighborhood in the middle of the camp, resulting in dozens of deaths and very serious injuries that were transported to the hospital.

All national and Islamic factions called for a comprehensive strike in all West Bank governorates, Friday, to mourn the slain Palestinians.

It is worth mentioning that, since October 7, 2023, the Tulkarem governorate has been subject to serious Israeli military escalation, leading to the death of 152 Palestinians, including twenty-one children and four women, bringing the number of slain Palestinians in the West Bank, to 741 including more than 160 children, 11 women and two medics.

This article will be updated to include more info, including the names of slain Palestinians after they have been confirmed and their families officially notified.
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Hamas Commander Killed in West Bank Airstrike That Left 18 Dead, IDF Says

Several other operatives were killed in the attack along with the leader of Hamas' Tul Karm network, who was behind the attempted terror attack in Ateret in September

by Reuters, Yaniv Kubovich, & Jack Khoury
Oct 4, 2024

At least 18 Palestinians were killed in an Israeli strike on the Tul Karm refugee camp in the West Bank, the Palestinian health ministry said on Thursday, with the Israeli military saying it killed a Hamas commander.

The Israeli military said in a statement that its air force had killed the head of Hamas' network in Tul Karm in a strike. It identified him as Zahi Yaser Abd al-Razeq Oufi.

The IDF and the Shin Bet security services also reported that the attack killed seven terrorists who were preparing to carry out an imminent attack.

According to the statement, several other Hamas operatives were killed in the attack. Oufi was behind the attempted terror attack in Ateret in the West Bank in September, and was planning many more such attacks while providing weapons across the region, the army said.

The Palestinian Health Ministry said the strikes in Tul Karm were directed at a building where a crowded café was. A Red Crescent paramedic said the building was badly damaged, and that a fire broke out at the scene. According to reports, many people are still trapped under the ruins.

The Palestinian government "calls for urgent international action to stop the escalating massacres" against its people, it said in a statement.

The official spokesman for the Palestinian presidency also condemned the attack, the Palestinian news agency WAFA said, adding that those attacks "will not bring security and stability to anyone, but will drag the region into more violence".

Violence has surged in the West Bank since the start of the war in Gaza, with almost daily sweeps by Israeli forces that have involved thousands of arrests and regular gun battles between security forces and Palestinian fighters.
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Tulkarem: Eighteen Slain Palestinians Identified

by IMEMC News
Oct 4, 2024

Thousands of Palestinians gathered, on Friday, to bury the eighteen Palestinians, including at least three children, who were executed on Thursday night by an Israeli airstrike in the Tulkarem refugee camp, in Tulkarem city, in the northwestern part of the occupied West Bank.

The slain Palestinians were identified as;
1. Ghaith Badi Radwan, 28,

2. Zahi Yasser Awfi, 40,

3. Ayman Khaled Tanji, 31,

4. Asem Noman Qawzah, 22,

5. Basil Mahmoud Nafeh, 18,

6. Anwar Mohammad Masimi, 35,

7. Ahmad Jamal Obeid, 35,

8. Saja Nasser Khrioush, 28,

9. Mahmoud Nasser Khrioush, 23,

10. Omar Nimr Fiat, 29,

11. Mohammad Salah Abu Zahra, 32,

12. Sham Mohammad Abu Zahra, 7,

13. Karam Mohammad Abu Zahra, 8,

14. Mohammad Mamoun Anbas, 16,

15. Rakan Bilal Awad,

16. Mohsen Ghazi Dabaia, 23,

17. Magdy Jamal Salem, 19, and

18. Athir Magdy Louisi, 28.

Media sources said that a large funeral procession commenced in front of the Martyr Thabet Thabet Governmental Hospital in Tulkarem city, while mourners marched through the streets carrying the bodies of the slain Palestinians on their shoulders.

Sources added that the mourners marched to the families’ homes in the Tulkarem refugee camp to pay their last respects, before performing the funeral prayer and burying 17 of the bodies in the Martyrs’ Cemetery in the Thnaba suburb, east of Tulkarem city, while the slain, Mohsen Ghazi Dabaia, was buried in the town of Attil, northeast of the city.

On Thursday night, occupation warplanes fired a missile at a popular café in the Al-Hamam neighborhood in the center of the Tulkarem refugee camp, killing eighteen and injuring many others.

Nimer Fayat, the owner of Dr. Coffee, told Al-Aribiya News that the targeted the café was full with “regular customers coming to eat and drink” when an Israeli fighter jet fired a missile at the building at 10:15 PM Thursday night.

Fayat said, “What happened was a very strong blow, the likes of which we had not seen in the past since the al-Aqsa Intifada,” referring to the second Intifada (uprising) which spanned from September of 2000 to February of 2005.

A relative of the Abu Zahra family, Yasser Jibra, told Al-Arabiya News that “This is the work of the criminal occupation, which does not take into account the presence of a child or a woman, or an elderly or young person,” adding that “Everything is permissible for them.”

In a joint statement with Shin Bet, the army claimed that the air strike targeted, Zahi Yasser Awfi, whom they claim was a “top Hamas commander in Tulkarem,” in addition to several other “operatives”.

The army accused of Awfi of planning and participating in multiple attacks against Israeli civilians, claiming that he was planning a major attack on the first anniversary of the Israeli military onslaught against the Gaza Strip on October 7, 2023.

Since the beginning of the Israeli military onslaught against the Gaza Strip on October 7, 2023, Israeli forces have killed 741 Palestinians in the West Bank, including 163 children, and injured 6,200.
The distribution of those killed in the West Bank is as follows; 196 in Jenin, 170 in Tulkarem, 75 in Nablus, 74 in Hebron, 59 in Ramallah, 57 in Tubas, 45 in Jerusalem, 29 in Qalqilia, 19 in Bethlehem, 12 in Jericho, 12 inside Israel, and 4 in Salfit.

Since October 7, 2023, Israeli forces have killed 41,788 Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, most of whom are women and children, and injured 96,794 citizens, while the bodies of thousands of citizens remained buried under the rubble of the devastated coastal enclave.

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