Palestinian gunmen fire at northern West Bank industrial zone, damaging building

Palestinian gunmen fired a hail of bullets Tuesday morning at a settlement industrial zone in the northern West Bank, the military said.

According to the Israel Defense Forces, slight damage was caused to a building in the Shahak industrial zone near the settlement of Shaked, about 10 kilometers west of the Palestinian city of Jenin.

There were no reports of injuries in the attack, which came hours after Israeli troops killed five Palestinian gunmen in the West Bank city of Nablus in a raid against the Lion’s Den terror group.

The IDF said troops launched a manhunt for the suspects, who fled the scene. The bullets were fired from outside the industrial zone.

Earlier Tuesday, Palestinian gunmen also fired at the Salem crossing in the northern West Bank, adjacent to the security barrier and close to the Arab Israeli town of the same name.

The checkpoint and adjacent base has been the target of numerous shooting attacks in recent weeks, leading Defense Minister Benny Gantz to order it shut.

The settlement of Shaked also came under a shooting attack last week.

The shootings came at a time of rising violence in the West Bank, particularly in the northern area, as Palestinian gunmen have repeatedly targeted military posts, troops operating along the West Bank security barrier, Israeli settlements and civilians on the roads.

Tensions in the Nablus area have ratcheted up in recent weeks, with Israel’s military placing a cordon around the Palestinian city to crack down on Lion’s Den.

Tuesday’s raid in Nablus was the latest to target Lion’s Den, a recently formed group made up of members of other terror organizations that has claimed a slew of attacks in the weeks since Israel killed senior al-Aqsa Martyr’s Brigade member Ibrahim al-Nabulsi in late August.

Gunmen at the funeral of those killed in clashes sparked by an overnight Israeli raid against the Lion’s Den terror group, in the West Bank city of Nablus on October 25, 2022 (RONALDO SCHEMIDT / AFP)

One Israeli soldier — Staff Sgt. Ido Baruch, 21 — was killed in an attack by the group and a second person was lightly injured in a separate assault on civilian vehicles. The other attacks have been ineffectual, but videos of the shootings uploaded to social media have helped it win massive popularity on the Palestinian street in a short period of time.

An anti-terror offensive launched earlier this year and focused on the northern West Bank has netted more than 2,000 arrests in near-nightly raids. It has also left over 120 Palestinians dead, many of them — but not all — while carrying out attacks or during clashes with security forces.

The IDF’s anti-terror offensive in the West Bank was launched following a series of Palestinian attacks that killed 19 people earlier this year. Another Israeli was killed in a suspected attack last month, and four soldiers have been killed in the West Bank in attacks and during the arrest operations.