Three Druze soldiers from the Israel Defense Forces’ Armored Corps have been arrested on suspicion of hurling improvised explosive devices at a Palestinian home in the Bethlehem area overnight Monday.
In a statement, the IDF Spokesperson’s Unit said “a number of IDF soldiers were apprehended” following the incident. The Military Police are examining a possible connection between the alleged attack and last week’s seizure of the body of an Israeli Druze youth from a Jenin hospital by Palestinian gunmen.
Tiran Fero, 18, from Daliyat el-Karmel, near Haifa, was mortally injured in a traffic accident while in the area to repair his vehicle last Tuesday. On Thursday, after some 30 hours, it was returned following efforts by Israeli security forces and in coordination with Palestinian Authority security forces, according to the Israeli military.
While the IDF said that Fero had died of his injuries before his body was snatched, his uncle Edri Fero, who was in the hospital room at the time of the incident, as well as Shaykh Mowafaq Tarif, the spiritual head of the Druze in Israel, said that the youth was still alive when the terrorists disconnected him from life support.
