’Israeli’ Settlers Murder Two Palestinians in West Bank

The official Palestinian news agency WAFA, citing the Palestinian Health Ministry, identified the victims of the Monday attack near the northern West Bank village of Aqrabah, located eighteen kilometers [11.18 miles] southeast of Nablus, as Abdulrahman Maher Bani Fadel, 30, and Mohammed Ashraf Bani Jame, 21.

Salah Bani Jaber, mayor of Aqrabah, who witnessed the settler attack, said that about 50 settlers, many of them armed, attacked members of his community.

They “assaulted residents and fired at people in the town leading to the death of two citizens,” the mayor said, adding that “the occupation army is still holding the bodies.”

“There were ‘Israeli’ soldiers at the scene who stood idly by watching the settlers,” he told the Reuters news agency.

The Palestine Red Crescent Society said “Israeli” soldiers blocked its ambulances from reaching the area and tending to the wounded.

Hundreds of “Israeli” extremist settlers, protected by the entity’s forces, have raided several towns in the occupied West Bank for the second consecutive day, hurling stones at passing vehicles and setting ablaze homes.