Israeli forces martyred two Palestinian militants on Friday, Palestinian sources said, in what the Israeli military said was a response to a drive-by shooting at soldiers in the occupied West Bank.
The Israeli military said its forces shot at “two suspicious vehicles” after a passing car fired at one of its posts near the city of Nablus, which has been at the heart of a surge in violence in the West Bank over recent months.
No soldiers were injured and “hits were identi-fied,” the Israeli military statement said, adding that soldiers launched a search for additional suspects.
The Palestinian Health Ministry identified the dead men as Emad Abu Rasheed, 47, and Ramzi Zabara, 35, both from Askar refugee camp near Nablus. It said a third man was wounded.
The militant al-Aqsa Brigades, an offshoot of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’s Fatah movement, claimed the two dead men as members.
According to Facebook posts by the Palestinian Civil Guard, the Palestinian Authority’s emergency and rescue service, the two men were also among its ranks.
The Palestinian Authority, which exercises lim-ited self-rule in the West Bank, coordinates security with Israel. The Israeli military did not respond to a question on the men’s affiliation with the Palestinian Civil Guard.—Reuters
