Palestinian injured when Israeli army shells residential building in Tulkarm, West Bank

By Aysar Alais

ISTANBUL (AA) - At least one Palestinian was injured on Saturday as the Israeli army shelled a residential building in Tulkarm in the northern West Bank.

Eyewitnesses told Anadolu that Israeli forces deployed military reinforcements, including bulldozers, to Tulkarm and besieged the building.

The witnesses reported that the army fired at least one Energa shell at an apartment within the building. The status of the apartment’s residents remains unclear.

A military bulldozer reportedly began demolishing parts of the building during the operation.

In the ongoing clashes, a Palestinian was injured by live ammunition in the legs, according to the Palestinian Red Crescent Society, which confirmed that its teams in Tulkarm “treated a gunshot wound to the legs sustained during confrontations with the Israeli occupation forces in Harat Al-Salam.”

According to the official Palestinian news agency Wafa, Israeli soldiers allegedly summoned the parents of one of the young men inside the besieged apartment, reportedly using them as human shields to pressure their son to surrender.

In a related development, the Al-Qassam Brigades, the armed wing of Palestinian resistance group Hamas, issued a statement claiming that their fighters had “targeted occupation forces in Harat Al-Salam and at the entrance to Tulkarm refugee camp with heavy gunfire.”

The Israeli army has carried out frequent raids in the West Bank over recent years, with operations intensifying since the escalation of conflict in Gaza last October. Palestinians in the West Bank have also faced violent attacks from Israeli settlers.

Since the start of the Gaza conflict, at least 760 Palestinians have been killed and around 6,300 injured by Israeli army fire in the West Bank, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry.

The current escalation follows a July opinion by the International Court of Justice, which declared Israel’s decades-long occupation of Palestinian territories “illegal” and called for the evacuation of all Israeli settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.

*Writing by Ikram Kouachi