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A Palestinian teenager was killed by Israeli army fire on Friday, while Israeli settlers torched a mosque and two vehicles in the West Bank, according to Palestinian sources, reported Xinhua. Palestinian security sources told Xinhua that Fahd Oweis, 16, was shot dead by Israeli forces in the town of al-Lubban al-Sharqiya, south of the northern West Bank city of Nablus. The sources added that Israeli forces withheld his body. The Palestine Red Crescent Society said in a statement that Israeli forces obstructed and assaulted its crews while they were attempting to reach the scene. The incident came hours after Israeli forces opened fire late Thursday on a vehicle in the same town and blocked ambulance access, according to local sources. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said in a statement on Friday that troops were conducting "a targeted counterterrorism operation" in the area where soldiers identified three "terrorists who hurled rocks toward Israeli vehicles on a central road, endangering lives." "The soldiers fired toward the terrorists and eliminated a masked terrorist. A hit on an additional terrorist was identified, and IDF soldiers have begun pursuing him and the third terrorist," it said. In a separate incident, Palestinian security sources said that Israeli settlers stormed the village of Jibiya, northwest of Ramallah in the central West Bank, at dawn on Friday, torching a mosque and two vehicles and spray-painting what the sources described as racist slogans on walls. The Palestinian Ministry of Awqaf and Religious Affairs condemned the attack in a statement, describing the burning of mosques as "a cowardly terrorist act." A 2025 UN report said that more than 700,000 Israeli settlers and 3.3 million Palestinians live in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem. Between May 5 and 11, the UN documented at least 33 Israeli settler attacks against Palestinians that resulted in casualties or property damage, bringing the total number of such attacks documented since the beginning of 2026 to over 800 across over 220 communities. Meanwhile, seven Palestinians were killed and at least 50 others injured on Friday evening in Israeli strikes targeting a residential apartment and a vehicle in Gaza City, according to Palestinian medical sources, reported Xinhua. The Israeli military said the strikes targeted Izz al-Din al-Haddad, a senior commander in the al-Qassam Brigades, the armed wing of Hamas. Israel's state-owned Kan TV news quoted a senior security official as saying the strike was "successful," and al-Haddad was likely killed. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Israel Katz said earlier in a joint statement that the Israeli military struck al-Haddad, claiming that he was one of the planners of the Hamas attack on southern Israel on October 7, 2023. Local sources and witnesses said Israeli warplanes fired at least three missiles at an apartment in the Al-Mu'taz building in western Gaza City, setting the apartment on fire. Medics told Xinhua that emergency teams transferred bodies of four victims, including a woman and a child, and 44 injured people to the Al-Saraya Field Hospital run by the Palestinian Red Crescent Society. Separately, local sources said Israeli drones struck a vehicle traveling on Al-Wehda Street in central Gaza City, killing three people and injuring six others. Al-Haddad, known by the nickname "Ghost of al-Qassam," is considered by Israel to be one of the most wanted figures. He has survived several previous assassination attempts, according to Israeli media.
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