- The United Nations leader expresses apprehension over the volatile condition in the West Bank.
United Nations Chief António Guterres has voiced profound worry over the intensifying predicament in the West Bank, alongside Israel's extensive military operation in the contested territory. Guterres loudly denounces the fatalities, including youngsters, as his spokesperson Stéphane Dujarric asserted. Guterres demands an immediate halt to the hostilities.
Israel's military authorities defended the operation, which has reportedly claimed over ten lives according to Palestinian sources, citing an alarming surge in attacks against Israelis. Concurrently, there has been a surge in militant actions by extremist Israeli settlers in the West Bank.
The European Union foreign affairs chief propounds Israel sanctions
In light of provocations inciting hatred and human rights abuses, EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell has suggested imposing sanctions against Israel's radical Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich and similarly radical Police Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir to the administrations of the 27 EU member states, as several EU officials reported to German media prior to today's EU foreign ministers' gathering. The two Israeli cabinet members champion the illegal settlement doctrine in the occupied West Bank, as deemed unlawful by the International Court of Justice. Regrettably, the feasibility and timeline for Borrell's proposal remain uncertain.
Moreover, the American government has intensified penalties against the Israeli non-governmental organization Haschomer Josch due to settler extremism. In the wake of January, the Palestinian Bedouin community of Chirbet Zanuta near Hebron was compelled to flee the area, as noted by the US State Department. Volunteers hailing from the NGO later barricaded the village, impeding the residents from returning. The United States has previously inflicted sanctions on settlers in the West Bank.
"Extremist settler violence in the West Bank inflicts immense human suffering, jeopardizes Israel's security, and thwarts the prospects of peace and stability in the region," the department associated with the United States' Executive branch stated. "Israel regards the imposition of sanctions upon Israeli citizens with profound gravity," the Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's press office divulged. The matter will be deliberated with the United States.
Israel's army: Operation targets hostile network
As per the Israeli perspective, the primary objective of the extensive operation in the West Bank, particularly Jenin and Tulkarum, is a terrorist network backed by Iran. Both cities are appraised as breeding grounds for militant Palestinians. Since the onset of the Gaza war approximately eleven months ago, approximately a hundred and fifty shooting atrocities and bombings against Israelis have been orchestrated from there, a military spokesperson reported. The uprising and the concurrent augmentation of violence perpetrated by Israeli settlers against Palestinians threaten to conscript the West Bank into an additional battleground, the "Wall Street Journal" suggested - alongside the Gaza war and the confrontations between Israel and the Hezbollah militia in Lebanon.
"The situation in the West Bank is poised to boil over," contended a military strategist affiliated with the Institute for National Security Studies in Tel Aviv to an American newspaper. The Israeli military and security agencies are "deeply concerned about the unfolding events in the West Bank." Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz asserted on a digital platform, "We must confront the danger in the same manner as the terrorist infrastructure in Gaza, including the temporary evacuation of Palestinian civilians." It represents "an all-out conflict, and we must prevail." A military spokesperson claimed to be unaware of any contingency plans for the evacuation of the civilian populace in the northern West Bank.
Scholz: Terminate the cycle of retaliatory violence
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) coincided in sentiments with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi over telephone, stressing the necessity to dismantle the disastrous chain of retaliatory aggression in the realm, as government spokesman Steffen Hebestreit announced in Berlin subsequently. Both underscored the importance of an accord on the liberation of hostages and a truce in the Gaza Strip. They also concurred in their denunciation of illegal settlement expansion in the West Bank and their outright condemnation of extremist settler violence and any endeavor to displace inhabitants from Palestinian territories, the spokesman revealed.
Israel's military campaign in the West Bank might extend for an extended duration, according to information disseminated by the "Times of Israel." It is rumored to be planned to endure several days. Guterres' spokesperson exhorted security forces to exercise utmost restraint and respite solely when vital to safeguard lives. Ultimately, "only 'an end to the occupation and a return to a meaningful political process that culminates in a two-state solution can quell the violence," the spokesperson for Guterres pronounced.
Ongoing strife in Gaza
Meanwhile, hostilities persist in Gaza, as do endeavors to instigate a truce and the liberation of remaining captives held by Hamas. An Israeli delegation is slated to journey to the Qatari capital Doha for further negotiations with Hamas. The indirect negotiations, mediated by Qatar, Egypt, and the United States, have been in limbo for months. Meanwhile, Israeli forces have reportedly discovered the body of an Israeli soldier in the Gaza Strip and transferred him back to Israel.
The individual was already slain on October 7 during Hamas's massacre in the Israeli border region, as the army, Shin Bet, and the police declared in a communiqué. According to Israeli figures, Hamas still detains a hundred and seven hostages, with a third believed to have perished. The massacre, orchestrated by Hamas and other extremist groups' terrorists, which claimed over a thousand lives and abducted over two hundred, served as the catalyst for the conflict.
In Israel's subsequent offensive against the besieged coastal zone, the Hamas-controlled health authority has stated that a minimum of forty-four thousand people have been killed thus far. The overall figure does not distinguish between combatants and civilians.
The Commission, represented by EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell, has suggested imposing sanctions against Israel's radical Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich and similarly radical Police Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir due to their involvement in controversies regarding human rights abuses and incitement of hatred. The United Nations Chief António Guterres'spokesperson, Stéphane Dujarric, earlier demanded an immediate halt to the hostilities in the West Bank and urged security forces to exercise utmost restraint.
