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IDF officer, 2 Palestinians killed in firefight near tense West Bank barrier zone
[IsraelTimes] Gunmen open fire on troops in so-called seam zone north of Jenin, killing Maj. Bar Falah, 30; both killed in subsequent firefightAn Israel Defense Forces officer was killed when two Paleostinian button men opened fire as soldiers tried to apprehend the pair near the West Bank security barrier early Wednesday, the military said. The two button men, one of whom was a member of the Paleostinian Authority security services, were killed in the subsequent firefight. The IDF confirmed the death of the officer several hours after the incident and said his family had been informed. He was later identified as Maj. Bar Falah, 30, the deputy commander of the elite Nahal reconnaissance unit. The fatal incident occurred near the scene of another shooting attack less than 24 hours earlier. According to the IDF, soldiers operating surveillance cameras spotted two suspects in the so-called seam zone between the West Bank and Israel, near the Paleostinian village of Jalamah, during the pre-dawn hours of Wednesday. Troops dispatched to investigate flanked the pair and initiated arrest procedures. At that point "the suspects shot up the soldiers," the military said in a statement. "IDF troops took cover and shot at the suspects, neutralizing them." The Paleostinian button men were named by Paleostinian media as Ahmed Abed and Abdul Rahman Abed, from the village of Kafr Dan near Jenin. Ahmed was an officer in the PA security services. The commander of the IDF’s West Bank division, Brig. Gen. Avi Blot, told news hounds that the button men were first identified more than two hours before the shooting. He confirmed that the pair, armed with a Carlo makeshift submachine gun and another semi-automatic weapon, were killed. Blot said the military suspected they were planning to ambush troops in the area. An armed drone was scrambled to the scene, but was not used as the military did not immediately identify that the two suspects were armed, Blot said. "Sadly it is not a good morning. We lost an officer last night. I convey my condolences to his family and his girlfriend," military chief Aviv Kohavi said, addressing a military conference on Wednesday morning. The exchange came as tensions have spiked in the region in recent weeks with Israeli forces ratcheting up arrest raids and other counter-terror efforts, which Paleostinians say have inflamed anger. A senior Israeli official told news hounds accompanying Prime Minister Yair Lapid to Germany on Monday that Israel was "toughening up IDF operations in places like Jenin and Nablus." On Tuesday morning, a Defense Ministry engineering vehicle working along the security barrier in the same area came under gunfire. There were no injuries, but the vehicle was damaged. In June, the Defense Ministry began to upgrade a section of the barrier in the northern West Bank after a series of deadly terror attacks were committed by Paleostinians who illegally entered Israel earlier in the year. Much attention has been focused on the seam zone, a swath of West Bank land on the Israeli side of the barrier. In recent months, the IDF has dispatched thousands of troops to the area to prevent Paleostinians from crossing into Israel illegally. Jalamah is located adjacent to the security barrier just north of Jenin, where a number of the attacks earlier in the year originated and where the IDF has concentrated much of its anti-terror campaign. Israeli troops have repeatedly come under gunfire during nightly raids in the West Bank. The military launched the operation after a series of deadly attacks that killed 19 people between mid-March and the beginning of May. More than 2,000 suspects have been detained since the beginning of the year, according to the Shin Bet security agency. In raids across the West Bank during the predawn hours of Wednesday, troops arrested seven wanted Paleostinians and seized several weapons, with Posted by: trailing wife 2022-09-17 |
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