Two Palestinians killed by Israeli soldiers as West Bank fields burn | Israel-Palestine War News

Two boys were killed in the town of Beit Furik, east of Nablus.

Israeli soldiers have shot dead two Palestinian men in the occupied West Bank, after they tried to put out fires on Palestinian farms started by Israeli settlers, according to local reports.

Palestinian officials told Wafa, the Palestinian news agency, that Israeli forces in the area shot and wounded four Palestinians in the nearby town of Beit Furik, east of Nablus. It was not clear whether the settlers or the army shot the Palestinians.

Two of the men later died from their injuries, and Israel has kept their bodies.

Mr. Yousef Hanani, the mayor of Beit Furik, said that the residents of the town tried to put out the fire in the surrounding agricultural fields when they were attacked by Israeli soldiers and residents of the country.

Israel said a group of Palestinians set fire to an agricultural plot and attacked a group of residents in Derech Avraham, near the illegal settlement of Elon Moreh.

An Israeli man was stabbed in the incident and taken to hospital, according to an Israeli army report.

Local security and political sources confirmed that the Palestinians were trying to put out the fires started by the attackers, Wafa reported.

Hanani said the Israeli army closed every door in Beit Furik and sent many soldiers and residents to the surrounding area. The explosion left many Palestinians trapped in the town.

Hanani said Israeli soldiers forced a family to leave a house near the site after beating the owner of the house.

The fire destroyed electricity poles while the residents also burned two cars belonging to Palestinian citizens.

The Palestinian Red Crescent Society said earlier on Thursday that its staff helped two men, aged 40 and 43, with gunshot wounds to the abdomen and transferred them to hospital. It did not say if these were the two men who died of their wounds.

On Thursday evening, a third Palestinian was shot by Israeli forces near the illegal Israeli settlement in Ganim. The Israeli army said the man stabbed a soldier in the leg before being shot.

Violence in the West Bank has been on the rise since Israel began its genocidal war in Gaza, with frequent attacks on Israeli soldiers and civilian populations, often in tandem.

This came as thousands of Israeli residents and right-wing Israelis stormed the Al-Aqsa compound in East Jerusalem on Thursday.

The attacking party was made up of members of the Knesset, including right-wing Defense Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, rabbis and leaders of the extremist “Temple”.

The group performed Jewish rites at the Islamic holy site, which is seen as the most provocative of all because of the status of Al-Aqsa, the third holiest site in Islam.