The UN has expressed concern that the ceasefire in Gaza could be endangered by Israel’s assault on the West Bank city of Jenin, which has involved what the UN human rights spokesperson labelled “unnecessary or disproportionate use of force”.
Thameen al-Kheetan of the UN human rights office called Israeli tactics in Jenin “deadly operations”, after Israel targeted a refugee camp in the centre of the city and besieged a nearby hospital.
“We are deeply concerned by the use of unlawful lethal force in Jenin, in the occupied West Bank,” he said on Friday, criticising “methods and means developed for war fighting, in violation of human rights law … this includes multiple airstrikes and apparently random shooting at unarmed residents attempting to flee or find safety.”
Israeli forces continued a sweeping crackdown across the West Bank as the assault on the Jenin refugee camp continued, in an operation Israel has called “Iron Wall”.
Security forces raided towns around Nablus and Jenin, while the Palestinian news agency Wafa said Israeli military bulldozers moved deeper into the Jenin refugee camp and destroyed several homes. Hundreds have fled the Jenin refugee camp and surrounding areas since Israeli forces began an operation there four days ago.
Kheetan said the UN human rights office had verified that more than 12 Palestinians had been killed and at least 40 injured since the Israeli assault on Jenin began, adding that the majority were reportedly unarmed. Medics in the governmental hospital close to the camp said their staff had been wounded after being shot with live ammunition.
Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said the aim of the operation was to target Palestinian militants in the Jenin refugee camp, to prevent them from launching attacks on Israeli territory. Critics accuse him of expanding the fighting to the West Bank to placate his far-right ally Bezalel Smotrich and maintain his ruling coalition.
Smotrich has threatened to quit the government if Israel does not resume fighting in Gaza after the first phase of the ceasefire ends in early March – a move that would remove Netanyahu’s parliamentary majority and likely trigger new elections.
“If, God forbid, the war is not resumed, I will bring the government down,” he told reporters earlier this week. Smotrich reportedly described the second Trump administration as “an opportunity”, for Israeli annexation of the West Bank.
Aseel Baidoun, of Medical Aid for Palestinians in the West Bank town of Ramallah, despaired at Israel’s expanding attacks on the territory.
“Even as one door to peace is pushed slightly open another starts to swing closed,” she said. “Not only are we confined by checkpoints and road closures, but people also face relentless attacks from Israeli settler mobs who act with impunity, backed by the full support of the Israeli army.”
She added: “Now that there is a suspension in Israel’s war on Palestinians in Gaza, it feels like the Israeli military is starting a war on us in the West Bank.”
At a small protest in central Jerusalem against Israel’s expanding war, dozens of activists held up signs decrying the ongoing fighting despite the Gaza ceasefire, and chanted to end Israel’s growing assault on towns across the West Bank.
“I think they want us to have this endless war … it’s shocking,” said anti-war activist Michal Brody-Bareket, who founded the Mother’s Cry group to demand the end to Israeli combat in Gaza, where her son has served in the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF).
“Of course this is political,” she said of Israel’s decision to launch the operation in Jenin. “This is all about Smotrich and the backing of the settler movement that support him. They want us fighting in the West Bank, in Gaza, and in Lebanon and Syria, too, so they can settle these places … this will cost a lot of lives.”
The protesters were met with immediate force by the Israeli police, who shoved several demonstrators and arrested three.
“What we’re doing in the West Bank in general seems like a plan to go back to the war in Gaza. They want to turn the West Bank into Gaza,” said protester Tamar Cohen. “This at least seems to be the plan by Smotrich and his cohort. He got his prize for not leaving the government over the hostage deal,” she said, holding a sign that read “refuse to fight in the war”.
Four Israeli female soldiers held hostage by Palestinian militants in Gaza are due to be released in the coming days in exchange for Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails, as part of a fragile six-week ceasefire deal.
Israel launched its longest war on Gaza following the attacks on towns and kibbutzim around the territory on 7 October 2023, when 250 people were taken hostage. Israel’s assault on Gaza has killed ever more than 47,000 people in 15 months of fighting.
Qatari prime minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman al-Thani said earlier this week that Doha is encouraging an early start to the second stage of talks, which include discussion on ending the war, scheduled to begin in the coming weeks.
Israeli officials believe that between a third and half of the 90 hostages that remain in Gaza have died, as anxious families of captives gathered in Tel Aviv to demand that Netanyahu and US president Donald Trump ensure the release of all the remaining hostages.
“The worry that the deal won’t be fully implemented gnaws at us all,” said Vicky Cohen, the mother of hostage Nimrod Cohen, who was taken captive from the Nahal Oz military base while serving in the IDF.
“All senior officials openly say that stopping the deal means a death sentence for those left behind.”
