IDF says soldier killed by roadside bomb in West Bank’s Nur Shams

An Israeli soldier was killed and another was seriously wounded by a roadside bomb in the West Bank’s Nur Shams refugee camp this morning, the military announces.

The slain soldier is named as Sgt. First Class (res.) Yehuda Geto, 22, a combat driver, from Pardes Hanna-Karkur.

The two soldiers were inside a Panther armored personnel carrier (APC) when the bomb exploded. Geto was the driver, and the seriously wounded soldier is a commander in the Duvdevan commando unit.

According to an initial IDF probe, the vehicle was waiting in an area of Nur Shams where the army did not believe explosive devices had been planted. Other Duvdevan troops had disembarked from the APC to carry out an operation on foot.

The APC was disabled by the large blast, and later towed out of Nur Shams. The IDF believes the bomb was improvised, using dozens of kilograms of explosive material.

During the extraction of the two soldiers, the IDF attempted to carry out a drone strike against a group of gunmen in the area, though the missile did not explode, the probe found.

Later, several gunmen attempted to tamper with the missile, but it exploded, killing a Palestinian woman who was standing nearby, according to the military probe.

Separately, Duvdevan troops shot dead a Palestinian gunman who tried to open fire on the forces, the IDF says.

The Palestinian Authority health ministry also reported two dead in Nur Shams, a woman and a child.

The incident comes days after a similar attack in the Jenin area, in which a soldier was killed and 16 others were hurt when Palestinian Islamic Jihad operatives detonated bombs against army vehicles during a raid.