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Palestinians in the West Bank carried the body of Hamza Abu El-Hijja, a son of a Hamas leader, who was killed by Israeli forces. Credit Abed Omar Qusini/Reuters

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JENIN (Ma'an) -- Three Palestinians were killed and seven others were injured early Saturday during clashes with Israeli troops who raided Jenin refugee camp in the northern West Bank, Palestinian security sources said.

The sources told Ma'an a large number of Israeli troops surrounded several Palestinian militants in a house in the camp and showered the house with gunshots.

Militants returned fire and eventually three of them were shot dead, the sources said.

The three were identified as Hamza Abu al-Haija, 22, Mahmoud Abu Zeina, 17, and 22-year-old Yazan Mahmoud Basim Jabarin.

The sources said the Israeli soldiers first attacked the house with rifle-fired Energa shells after Abu al-Haija refused to surrender.

Locals and security sources said that Abu al-Haija was a prominent leader of Hamas' military wing al-Qassam Brigades, while Abu Zeina was affiliated to Islamic Jihad's al-Quds Brigades.

Jabarin, 23, was a member of al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades, the military wing of the Fatah movement, a Hamas statement said.

When Israeli troops withdrew from the camp, dozens of men rushed to the house. They said that seven men were found injured. They were identified as Mahmoud Kamil Abu Hashish, Rafat Said Ali Uweis, Muamin Abdullah Isam Nashrati, Hussein Abu Tabeikh and Qasam Mahmoud Jabarin.

Hamas' statement said that at the beginning of the raid, clashes broke between Israeli troops and Abu al-Haija, who was barricaded in the house of a friend identified as Hamza Ballas.

The other two militants were shot dead in clashes that broke out with Israeli troops after Abu al-Haija was killed, Hamas said.

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by Saed Bannoura - IMEMC News

A large contingent of Israeli troops invaded Jenin refugee camp in a pre-dawn raid, on Saturday, surrounding a house with the apparent intention of abducting an inhabitant of the house. The soldiers, however, initiated the fire and, when inhabitants of the house returned fire, shot dozens of rounds into the house, killing 3 fighters and wounding 7 others.

Medical sources in Jenin identified the men who were killed as Hamza Abu al-Haija, 22, Mahmoud Abu Zeina, 17, and Yazan Mahmoud Basim Jabarin, 23. No Israeli troops were injured during the assault on the camp.

The injured men were identified as Mahmoud Kamil Abu Hashish, Rafat Said Ali Uweis, Muamin Abdullah Isam Nashrati, Hussein Abu Tabeikh and Qasam Mahmoud Jabarin.

Jenin refugee camp is located on the outskirts of the city of Jenin, in the northern part of the West Bank. The camp became a center of Palestinian resistance, in the West Bank, following a 2001 Israeli invasion in which hundreds of civilians were killed and a large portion of the camp was leveled with bulldozers.

In Saturday's invasion, local sources report that the Israeli troops, along with members of the Israeli Shin Bet Secret Service, moved into the camp in an attempt to either abduct or assassinate Abu al-Haija. The 22-year-old was identified by the Israelis as being a leader in the armed wing of the Hamas party, of the al-Qassam Brigades.

The other two men killed represented the other main armed resistance groups in Palestine: 17-year old Abu Zeina was affiliated with the Islamic Jihad's armed wing, the al-Quds Brigades, and the 23-year old Jabarin was identified as a member of the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, the armed wing of the Fatah movement.

The Israeli military had placed Abu Zeina on a 'wanted' list, accusing him of trying to plan attacks against Israelis.

No charges were ever filed against Abu Zeina. He had received no warning of the impending assault that would end up taking his life.

The Israeli policy of extra-judicial assassination of people suspected of criminal or resistance activity has been condemned by international law and the United Nations, but Israeli troops continue to carry out such executions with impunity.

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By JODI RUDOREN and FARES AKRA MMARCH 22, 2014
for the New York Times

JERUSALEM — Israeli forces killed three Palestinians and wounded at least seven others early Saturday when their attempt to arrest a person suspected of being a militant in the restive Jenin refugee camp erupted into a violent clash.

Outraged Palestinian leaders said the episode raised to 60 the number of Palestinians killed since the beginning of American-led peace talks last summer. They warned that what they described as a purposeful Israeli escalation in recent days threatened to scuttle the negotiations and spawn a surge of violence in the West Bank.

Nabil Abu Rudeineh, a spokesman for President Mahmoud Abbas of the Palestinian Authority, condemned the Israeli raid and called on the Obama administration “to move quickly to prevent the collapse of everything.”

The fragile negotiations are at a crucial moment. Washington is pressing for an extension of the talks’ nine-month timetable, but a disagreement between Israeli and Palestinian leaders over the terms for a release of Palestinian prisoners scheduled for this week could cause a breakdown.

On Saturday, Lt. Col. Peter Lerner of the Israel Defense Forces told reporters that troops went to Jenin before dawn to arrest Hamza Abu El-Hijja, 22, whom he described as a “ticking time bomb” involved in past shootings of Israelis and “in the advanced stages of planning further attacks.” Colonel Lerner said Mr. Abu El-Hijja fired at the troops from inside a house in the refugee camp where he was holed up, and shot an Israeli attack dog.

Mr. Abu El-Hijja, the son of a prominent leader of the militant Islamic Hamas Party who is an inmate in an Israeli prison, was killed as he tried to escape, and two members of the Israeli special forces team were wounded in a shootout, Colonel Lerner said.

The other two Palestinians who were killed were identified as Omar Abu Zaina, 27, a member of Islamic Jihad, and Zain Jabarin, 23, of the armed wing of Fatah, Mr. Abbas’s faction. Palestinian news media reported that they were unarmed, though Colonel Lerner said they had “weapons or explosive devices” and were “part of a contingency plan” to corner the Israeli troops.

Azmi Ballas, 67, the owner of the house where Mr. Abu El-Hijja had taken refuge, said he and a dozen family members awoke around 2 a.m. to the sounds of “bullets, shells and grenades.” They spent two hours huddled in their house until Israeli soldiers ordered them to leave, Mr. Ballas said, adding that one of his sons was shot in a shoulder and another was hit on the head with a rifle during the raid.

It was the most severe clash between Israel and Palestinians in months and highlighted both the growing tension between the two sides in the West Bank and the deep divisions within Palestinian politics.

Hamas issued a statement blaming not just Israel but also the Palestinian Authority, calling on it “to stop the comedy of the so-called security coordination with the Israeli occupation.” At the men’s funerals in Jenin on Saturday, according to Reuters, thousands of mourners crowded around the coffins draped with flags from their armed groups, protesting the talks with Israel with chants like “Where are you, Abbas? They killed us while you watched.”

Leaders of Fatah condemned Israel for not coordinating the raid with the Palestinian Authority’s security forces, because Jenin is supposedly under full Palestinian control. But Colonel Lerner and other Israeli officers said the Palestinians did not generally operate in refugee camps.

“There is good coordination with the Palestinian security, but we understand that they don’t work for us,” a senior Israeli military official who works in the West Bank said in an interview last week, speaking on the condition of anonymity under army protocol. “We cannot order them what to do. They cannot be everywhere even if they wanted to — they don’t have the capability. And there are places where they don’t go.”

The Jenin camp, with about 16,000 residents, was the site of one of the fiercest battles of the second intifada, or uprising, with more than 50 Palestinians and 23 Israeli soldiers killed over 10 days in April 2002. Mr. Abu El-Hijja’s father, Jamal, was arrested during the 2002 incursion, Palestinian officials said, and is serving nine life sentences for his role in fatal bomb attacks as a Hamas leader there.

Two Israeli arrest raids into the camp in August and September left three Palestinians dead. The camp is considered a Fatah stronghold, with a Hamas presence that Mr. Abu El-Hijja may have been trying to strengthen.

Colonel Lerner said Mr. Abu El-Hijja had been on Israel’s “wanted” list for months. Safa, a Gaza-based Palestinian news agency, reported Saturday that Israeli troops had tried to arrest Mr. Abu El-Hijja in December, but that he had escaped after a clash. Another Palestinian was killed in the standoff.

Moshe Yaalon, Israel’s defense minister, praised the forces that conducted the Jenin raid for their “determination and professionalism in a complex battlefield,” saying the operation “actually saved lives” by thwarting an attack.

Jodi Rudoren reported from Jerusalem, and Fares Akram from the Gaza Strip. Isabel Kershner contributed reporting from Jerusalem.