Published: 22 August 2023
Last updated: 5 March 2024
A 40-year-old kindergarten teacher and mother of three is the latest victim after a shooting attack in the West Bank on Monday.
Israel is "in the middle of an escalation and a wave of terror, the likes of which we haven't seen for quite a while," according to acing an IDF Central Command chief Major Gen. Yehuda Fuchs.
His comment came after an Israeli woman was killed and a man seriously injured while travelling in a car in the south Hebron hills yesterday. A 12-year-old girl, who was also in the car, was uninjured.
The woman was later identified as Batsheva Nigri, a mother of three and kindergarten teacher from the settlement of Beit Hagai. She becomes the 27th Israeli victim of terror this year.
On Saturday a 60-year-old man and his 29-year-old son were killed in another attack near the West Bank town of Huwara. The two deceased men – Shay Nigrekar and his son Aviad, residents of Ashdod – had traveled to the area for personal errands and were sitting near the entrance of the car wash when the assailant had entered the area.
The Israeli army is readying for possible settler violence in the West Bank in response to the attacks. Huwara was the scene of a settler rampage earlier this year.
In another incident Palestinians set fire to an Israeli man's vehicle after he mistakenly entered the central West Bank town of Turmus Ayya on Sunday evening. Israeli forces arrived at the scene and rescued the Israeli with the help of some of the town's residents.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Monday evening and said that Israel "is in the middle of a terror attack that is encouraged, guided and funded by Iran and its satellite states." Israel, he said, would employ measures to settle the score with the attackers and those who sent them, from near or far.
The Hamas militant group and Palestinian Islamic Jihad praised the attacks as a response to Israel’s expanding settlement enterprise in the West Bank, but stopped short of claiming responsibility.
READ MORE
Israeli woman killed in West Bank shooting attack, another injured (Haaretz)
IDF braces for settler retaliation after suspected West Bank shooting kills two Israelis (Haaretz)
Palestinians torch Israeli man's car after he mistakenly enters West Bank town (Haaretz)
Right calls for new military campaign as IDF searches for Huwara shooter (Jerusalem Post)
Photo: The vehicle torched when an Israeli mistakenly drove into the West Bank village of Turmus Ayya on Sunday evening.