2,000 Residents Told to Leave Homes as Troops Search 200 Hebron Sites
The military operation follows a Friday shooting that killed two soldiers at Yehuda Junction.
By Lina Lewis ·
Israeli troops and Civil Administration personnel demolished structures built without permits near Hebron's northern entrance on Saturday. The work continued a military operation that began after a shooting on Friday at Yehuda Junction. That attack killed St.-Sgt. Ron Yonatan Roytman and Sgt. Yuval Shai Svilem. The military said the buildings near the junction were torn down to enforce law and remove potential security threats.
The Judea Brigade commands the campaign. Troops involved include the Duvdevan and Maglan units, the Paratroopers Brigade, Givati reconnaissance reservists and Border Police. The Shin Bet security agency provides intelligence. Soldiers searched about 200 locations and ruled out weapons and terrorist activity at those sites. Ten suspects were arrested.
IDF assessments put roughly 2,000 residents of the area in the Ja'aba clan. The clan is linked to Hamas, and the gunmen in Friday's attack came from it. Central Command identified the attackers as Hamouda and Firas al-Ja'aba. Both were affiliated with Hamas, and the two came from the Ein Dir-Baha neighborhood.
The military began evacuating the al-Jalda and Ein Dir-Baha neighborhoods on Friday evening. Those districts sit in western Hebron within the city's Palestinian urban area. Civilians who asked to leave could exit temporarily through checkpoints run by the Shin Bet and the IDF. Officials said removing residents lets troops and Shin Bet personnel search homes, buildings and the ground around them for weapons, ammunition, explosives laboratories and caches without endangering civilians. The area is known to the security establishment as a center of Hamas activity in Hebron.
A situational assessment was set for Saturday to decide whether to widen the operation. In the meantime, Brig.-Gen. Kobi Heller, commander of the IDF's West Bank Division, broadened arrest operations and searches in Nablus, Jenin and Tulkarm, along with other locations across Samaria. Those expanded operations come as officials raise concerns about Hamas leadership abroad working to stage attacks before the elections.
The military said the search of about 200 locations found no weapons or terrorist activity, and 10 suspects were arrested.
