JERUSALEM (AP) – Palestinians marched furiously on Friday to bury the last of 10 Palestinians killed in Israeli fires the day before.
The capital was besieged as brawls erupted between Israeli forces and Palestinian protesters after his 22-year-old Palestinian funeral was held north of Jerusalem and elsewhere in the occupied West Bank. Silence reigned and Gaza was put under lockdown.
Thursday’s raid on the hotspot’s Jenin refugee camp ended in a shootout that left at least nine Palestinians dead, with clashes elsewhere killing a tenth. The missiles were fired and Israel carried out airstrikes throughout the night, but exchanges were limited and followed known patterns that allowed both sides to respond without leading to a large explosion.
The situation poses a challenge to Secretary of State Anthony Brinken ahead of his visit to the region on Sunday. He will likely discuss the root causes of the ongoing conflict, the agenda of Israel’s new far-right government, and the Palestinian authorities’ decision to end security cooperation with Israel in retaliation for the deadly raid.
Meanwhile, Israel’s defense minister has instructed the military to prepare for a new attack in Gaza “if necessary”, leaving the possibility of a clear decline in violence.
At his 22-year-old funeral, thousands of Palestinians waved the flags of the Fatah Party, which controls the Palestinian Authority, and the militant group Hamas, which controls the Gaza Strip. In the streets of the city called al-Ram, masked Palestinians threw stones and set off firecrackers at Israeli police, who responded with tear gas.
However, both Palestinian missiles and Israeli airstrikes appeared to be limited in order to prevent them from escalating into a full-scale war. Israel and Hamas have fought four wars and several minor skirmishes since militant groups seized power in Gaza from rival Palestinian forces in 2007.
Palestinian rockets were fired into southern Israel, while non-lethal Israeli airstrikes targeted targets in Gaza, including training camps and an underground rocket factory.
Israeli police were on duty in Jerusalem, and thousands of Muslim worshipers gathered in the stone courtyard of the Al-Aqsa Mosque to sing prayers and songs of solidarity for those killed in the Jenin attack.
Tensions in the Holy Land, revered by Jews as the Temple Mount, have sparked violence in the past, including the bloody Gaza War of 2021. Nearly 150 Palestinians were killed in the West Bank and East Jerusalem last year, according to B’Tselem, Israel’s leading human rights group, making 2022 the deadliest in those areas since 2004. 30 killed in Palestinian attacks.
Israel says most of the dead were militants. However, young people who opposed the attacks and those who were not involved in the clashes were also killed.
As young Palestinians roamed and women sold raisins, news of those killed in Jenin and of rockets at night rang out on phones and radios in Jerusalem’s Old City on Friday. The PA has limited control over scattered West Bank enclaves and little control over militant strongholds such as Jenin Camp.
Israel has built dozens of settlements in the West Bank, housing half a million people. Many Palestinians and the international community regard settlements as illegal and an obstacle to peace.
