Israel kills 18 Palestinians in airstrike on Tulkarem refugee camp in West Bank

RAMALLAH, Palestine (AA) – At least 18 Palestinians were killed and several others injured in an Israeli airstrike late Thursday on the Tulkarem refugee camp in the northern occupied West Bank.

The Palestinian Ministry of Health confirmed the death toll in a statement. Earlier, it said that 16 people were killed in the attack.

The official Palestinian news agency Wafa said that “Israeli warplanes struck a popular cafe in the Al-Hamam neighborhood of the Tulkarem camp.”

Rescue services, including civil defense and ambulances, rushed to the scene and transported the dead and the injured to Martyr Thabet Thabet Governmental Hospital in Tulkarem, according to the news agency.

The Palestine Red Crescent Society said its teams transported the bodies of five people and one injured person to the hospital, Wafa added.

Following the airstrike, the Israeli army said that one of its fighter jets targeted the Tulkarem refugee camp as part of a joint operation with the Shin Bet security agency.

Later, the army said that it assassinated Zahi Yaser Abd al-Razeq Oufi, the head of Hamas in Tulkarem.

“Earlier today, in a joint IDF (army) and ISA (Israel Security Agency, or Shin Bet) counterterrorism operation, the IAF (Israeli Air Force) conducted an ISA intelligence-based strike in the Tulkarem area and eliminated…Zahi Yaser Abd al-Razeq Oufi,” the head Hamas in Tulkarem, a military statement said.

The army claimed that “Oufi planned and led the attempted car-bombing attack in Ateret on 02.09.2024.”

The Israeli newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth reported that the airstrike was the first of its kind carried out by an Israeli fighter jet in the West Bank since the Second Intifada in 2000.