Israeli forces reportedly withdrew from the West Bank city of Jenin on Friday after launching the largest military assault on the illegally occupied territory in more than two decades, leaving in their wake destroyed roads, homes, medical infrastructure, and Palestinian lives.
The 10 days of raids in Jenin as well as Tulkarem and other areas of the West Bank have killed dozens of people, including a 16-year-old Palestinian girl, and wounded and displaced many more, compounding damage done by preceding months of violence by Israeli soldiers and settlers. Israeli forces were also accused of targeting journalists and healthcare workers during their raids.
Doctors Without Borders, known internationally as Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), said in a statement Thursday that the large-scale West Bank assault "severely" hindered "Palestinians' ability to access medical care" and forced the humanitarian group to suspend some of its operations.
One volunteer paramedic trained by MSF said she was "hit by munitions from the air and was injured above my eye and got shrapnel wounds" even though she was clearly identifiable as medical personnel. Another paramedic said Israeli forces stormed his home and assaulted him despite his efforts to make clear he was a healthcare worker.
"I informed them several times that I was a volunteer for medical organizations," the paramedic said, "but they dragged me out and kicked my back before pointing a weapon at my head."
While Israeli soldiers appeared to have withdrawn from Jenin and other areas by Friday morning, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) signaled that the assault was not yet over.
"Israeli security forces are continuing to act in order to achieve the objectives of the counterterrorism operation," the IDF said in a statement.
Residents who witnessed the latest raids and their aftermath firsthand described the indiscriminate nature of the IDF's assault, saying Israeli forces wantonly bulldozed roads, cut off water and electricity services, and attacked homes. The IDF said it ripped up roads to unearth explosives.
"It felt like Gaza," 36-year-old Lina Al Amouri toldCNN by telephone from Jenin. "All the streets were destroyed. Soldiers were everywhere, continuing to bulldoze everything around them, not just the streets."
Duha Turkman, an 18-year-old West Bank resident who sheltered in her aunt's home during the assault, said Thursday that "when we look at Gaza, we realize that we have been going through this for nine days, and it is already incredibly difficult for us."
"We can only imagine what the people in Gaza are enduring," said Turkman. "The situation here mirrors Gaza with airstrikes, bulldozing, and it doesn't seem like the situation will change anytime soon.”
Abu Sarur, a father of seven, toldThe New York Times that "there is no humanity."
"They uprooted the trees, broke the buildings," he continued. "The sewer mains meters under the ground, they ripped them up. The electricity, the water—they didn't leave anything untouched."
Reports of the IDF's withdrawal from Jenin came as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu continued to obstruct cease-fire talks to end the U.S.-backed war on Gaza and free the remaining hostages.
In a statement posted to Facebook late Thursday, the Palestinian Foreign Ministry said that "in full view of the international community and countries that claim to uphold the principles of human rights, protection of civilians, and the two-state solution, the occupying state continues to reproduce its brutal crimes and scenes of destruction and devastation that it committed in the Gaza Strip, now transferring them to the occupied West Bank, as seen in Jenin and Tulkarm and their refugee camps."
"This is a clear targeting of Palestinian civilians and the foundations of their national and human existence on their homeland," the ministry added.
