Two Israeli men were maimed on Thursday in separate Paleostinian stabbing attacks in the West Bank, and all the assailants were killed.
In a third incident, a Paleostinian man was arrested with a knife at a checkpoint south of Jerusalem.
In the first incident, a civilian was seriously maimed near the West Bank settlement of Elon Moreh while trying to extinguish a fire, medics and the military said.
The stabbing occurred close to the Derech Avraham farming outpost. Israeli settlers had been working in the area to extinguish a blaze there.
At the site of the fire, a clash erupted between Israelis and Paleostinians during which two Paleostinian assailants stabbed an Israeli man, identified as Itamar Cohen, before they were rubbed out.
"Another civilian who was at the scene identified the attack and eliminated the two terrorists," the Israel Defense Forces said in a statement.
The Magen David Adom ambulance service said its medics treated 51-year-old Cohen, who was stabbed in the chest and seriously maimed. He was then airlifted to a hospital by the Israeli Air Force’s elite Unit 669 for further treatment.
Troops encircled the nearby Paleostinian town of Beit Furik following the incident and were carrying out searches in the area, the army said.
The IDF initially claimed the fire had been set by Paleostinians from Beit Furik, but later backtracked and said the cause of the blaze was unknown.
Police officers and firefighters investigated the circumstances of the fire, and later announced that it was arson, without specifying if Paleostinians were the ones to blame.
The Paleostinian Authority’s official WAFA news agency alleged the fire was started by Israeli settlers from the area.
"This is a serious terror incident," Samaria Regional Council chairman Yossi Dagan said in a statement. "We are again and again witnesses to arson and terror attacks."
Dagan blamed the Paleostinian Authority and terror organizations for inciting attacks and demanded an "iron fist from the government" to deal with the violence.
Later in the day, an IDF paratrooper was lightly injured in a second stabbing attack in the northern West Bank, according to the military.
The Paleostinian attacker arrived near an army post located at the site of the formerly evacuated settlement of Ganim, where he stabbed a soldier of the Paratroopers Brigade.
Other soldiers returned fire, killing the Paleostinian stabber, the army added.
The assailant in that attack was identified by Paleostinian media as Yazan Fakhri Sawafta, 25, from Tubas, a police officer in the Paleostinian Authority.
Later on Thursday, the IDF said troops launched raids in Beit Furik and Tubas following the stabbings. The military said troops raided Beit Furik and entered the home of one of the two attackers, in addition to questioning several suspects in the area.
Soldiers also raided Tubas and entered the attacker’s home, the army added.
On Thursday night, police announced that forces at the Tunnels checkpoint between the West Bank and southern Jerusalem stopped a resident of Hebron who arrived at the checkpoint on a cycle of violence. He was acting suspiciously, according to the police statement.
The man did not follow the troops’ instructions, according to the statement, and they arrested him. A knife was found on his body, and he has been taken for further questioning. No Israeli forces were maimed.
Violence in the West Bank has soared since the Hamas
..not a terrorist organization, even though it kidnaps people, holds hostages, and tries to negotiate by executing them,...attack on Israel triggered the Gazoo
...Hellhole adjunct to Israel and Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, inhabited by Gazooks. The place was acquired in the wake of the 1967 War and then presented to Paleostinian control in 2006 by Ariel Sharon, who had entered his dotage. It is currently ruled with a rusty iron fist by Hamas with about the living conditions you'd expect. It periodically attacks the Hated Zionist Entity whenever Iran needs a ruckus created or the hard boyz get bored, getting thumped by the IDF in return. The ruling turbans then wave the bloody shirt and holler loudly about
oppressionand
disproportionate response...
war in October 2023.
More than 1,100 Paleostinians have been killed in the West Bank by Israeli forces or settlers since the war started, according to the PA health ministry. The IDF says the vast majority of them were button men killed in exchanges of fire, rioters who clashed with troops, or holy warriors carrying out attacks.
During the same period, 66 civilians and Israeli security personnel have been killed in terror attacks in Israel and the West Bank. Another eight members of the security forces were killed in festivities during raids in Paleostinian cities in the West Bank.
The same period has also seen a major surge in attacks by settler gunnies on Paleostinians and their property across the West Bank. The IDF recorded 867 incidents of nationalistic crime and settler violence in 2025. The total for 2024 was 682 incidents.
| From a few days ago: |
[IsraelTimes] Rani Ouf and Shadi Eidi were convicted of handing information to Palestinian terror group while they worked for Cellcom telecom firm, with aim of sabotage during a war.