Israeli killed in West Bank and two attackers shot dead

An Israeli man was killed in the occupied West Bank on Thursday, local authorities said, with the military and first responders saying that two attackers were shot dead.

Emergency services said they were called to reports of a person injured in a shooting in the car park of a shopping center in Gush Etzion, south of Jerusalem.

"Paramedics pronounced a 22-year-old man dead at the scene with gunshot wounds," Israel's Magen David Adom said in a statement.

"The two terrorists were eliminated by IDF forces and other security personnel at the scene," it added, referring to the Israeli military.

A local official told AFP the victim was an Israeli citizen.

The army said separately that its troops killed "two terrorists" who launched "a shooting and stabbing attack" in Gush Etzion.

"Soldiers and additional security personnel at the scene fired toward the terrorists and eliminated them," the military said in a statement.

The military generally uses the term "eliminated" after killing someone.

It said soldiers were encircling the Palestinian town of Halhul and setting up roadblocks in the area following the attack.

In a statement, the Israeli police said the two assailants were from Halhul, near Hebron.

Earlier Thursday, Palestinian authorities said Israeli troops killed a 55-year-old man in the north West Bank village of Rummanah, where the Israeli military said there was a stabbing attack.

The Ramallah-based health ministry said the body in charge of coordination with Israel informed it that soldiers "shot and killed" the man in Rummanah, near Jenin, in the morning.

The Israeli military said separately that troops deployed in the village "neutralized" a man after he stabbed and "moderately injured" a soldier.

- Mass arrests -

Violence in the West Bank, which Israel has occupied since 1967, has soared since the Hamas attack of October 2023 triggered the Gaza war.

The Palestinian Prisoners Club advocacy group told AFP on Thursday that at least 52 Palestinians were arrested throughout the West Bank in the past 48 hours.

The military did not comment on the circumstances of the arrests.

Among them was Sajaa Daraghmeh, who had been released during a prisoner exchange during the six-week ceasefire between Hamas and Israel, spokeswoman for the Prisoners Club Amani Sarahnah told AFP.

A 12-year-old Palestinian boy died on Wednesday of wounds suffered during an army raid near the West Bank town of Nablus last week, the health ministry said.

Since October 7, 2023, Israeli troops or settlers have killed at least 951 Palestinians, including many militants, the ministry said.

Over the same period, at least 36 Israelis have been killed in Palestinian attacks or during Israeli military operations, according to Israeli figures.