The IDF and the Shin Bet overnight Wednesday eliminated the head of the terrorist infrastructure in the Balata camp in Nablus, Abdullah Abu Shalal, who together with four members of his squad planned to carry out a major attack in the immediate future. Abu Shalal et al were killed from the air by a drone.
The squad was eliminated near the Balata camp in Shechem, Samaria. It was responsible for one of the main terrorist infrastructures in Judea and Samaria. The leader, Abu Shalal, was responsible for several attacks that were carried out in the past year, among them the shooting attack in the Shimon Hatzadik neighborhood in Jerusalem last April in which two Israeli civilians were injured. He was also responsible for an explosive charge attack against an IDF force last October in which an IDF soldier was injured.
Al Quds reported that IDF forces stormed the home of the security prisoner Dr. Ayser Barghouti, in the Batn al-Hawa neighborhood of Ramallah. Barghouti and Khaled al-Kharuf, two physicians from Ramallah, and Mureed Dahadha, a male nurse from Jalazone, were arrested on January 7 by the Yamam counterterrorism unit on suspicion of carrying out a terrorist attack in Binyamin that murdered an Arab resident of eastern Jerusalem and critically injured a female Arab pharmacist.
WAFA reported that a large IDF force, consisting of some 30 military vehicles, including bulldozers, blockaded the Balata camp before storming it amid airstrikes and overflights by planes and drones, leading to violent confrontations between the camp’s residents and the forces.
Al Quds also reported that IDF forces continued their raids into cities and towns in the Palestinian Authority overnight Wednesday, and confrontations broke out with Arab youths there, while the soldiers were arresting dozens of suspects.
The IDF stormed the town of Anata east of Jerusalem, and the villages of Nahalin and Husan west of Bethlehem.
A local source reported that confrontations broke out between Arab youths and Israeli forces, as the soldiers fired live bullets and tear gas at the protesting youths. They also closed shops and stormed and searched several homes.
The Red Crescent announced that a young man was injured by IDF bullets during confrontations in the village of Madama, south of Shechem. The IDF also stormed the town of Asira al-Qibliya, south of Shechem.
Local sources said that the IDF stormed the Ain Sultan refugee camp, north of Jericho in Judea. The sources added that the soldiers surrounded a house amid heavy firing of stun grenades and tear gas, and arrested a young man, claiming that he was wanted by the security services.
The IDF set up barriers at the entrances to the towns of Qalqilya and arrested a young man in front of the entrance to the town of Nabi Elias, east of the city.
The people of the city of Dura south of Hebron buried the bodies of Muhammad Abu Sebaa and Ahed Mtair, who were killed by the IDF on Monday. The funeral coincided with a city-wide strike “to mourn the two martyrs.”
According to PA Arab sources, Israeli forces arrested 50 Arab suspects overnight Wednesday, including children and prisoners who had been freed in the Shalit exchange.
