The Israel Defense Forces arrested the terrorist cell behind regular rock-throwing attacks targeting Jewish drivers on the Route 60 highway in southern Samaria this week, the military said on Thursday.
IDF soldiers “closed a circle and, in a targeted operation, arrested three terrorists who had had regularly thrown stones toward Route 60" in the area of Silwad, near Ramallah, according to the military’s statement.
Route 60 is the main north-south highway in Judea and Samaria. Arab rock-throwers from Silwad have repeatedly targeted drivers near the Jewish community of Ofra, with attacks increasing in recent months.
As part of counter-terrorism activities across the Judea and Samaria region, Israeli security forces arrested some 80 wanted terrorists this week, confiscating dozens of weapons, explosives and ammunition.
During a “focused effort” to thwart terrorist attacks emanating from the Balata camp on the eastern outskirts of Nablus (Shechem) in central Samaria, Israeli security forces arrested “several wanted individuals,” the IDF said.
On Thursday morning, the forces confiscated an M16 rifle belonging to a detained terrorist in Nablus’s Jabal Shamali neighborhood, the army said.
The detained terrorists and confiscated weapons were transferred for investigation to the Israel Security Agency (Shin Bet) and the Israel Police’s Judea and Samaria District, the military statement added.
Palestinian terrorists targeted Israeli Jews in Judea and Samaria at least 6,343 times in 2024, according to figures published by the Rescuers Without Borders (Hatzalah Judea and Samaria) NGO on Feb. 17.
Twenty-seven Israelis were murdered in Judea and Samaria in 2024, and more than 300 others were wounded, the group said in its annual report.
The figures, which were cross-checked against official data from Israel’s security services, included 3,668 instances of rock-throwing; 843 attacks with Molotov cocktails; 671 attempts to blind drivers with laser pointers; 526 explosive charges; 364 cases of arson; and 179 terrorist shootings.
The rescue group also recorded 37 attempted or successful stabbings; 36 bottles of paint being thrown at vehicles; and 19 Palestinian car-ramming attacks, including 12 that caused injuries to Israelis.
The report noted that the Shin Bet last year foiled more than 1,000 potential terrorist attacks in Judea, Samaria and Jerusalem.
