An Israeli soldier sustained serious injuries in an explosion in the town of Beita near Nablus on Wednesday, prompting the Israel Defense Forces to circle the locale in search of the culprits, the army said.
The soldier, a reservist, was part of an operational activity by his Battalion 9221, a patrol and reconnaissance unit belonging to the Ephraim regional division, the IDF Spokesperson’s unit said in a statement. The wounded soldier was transferred for treatment in Israel.
The IDF encircled and sealed Beita, a town of some 11,000 residents situated about three miles south of Nablus in the center of Samaria, and began searching for the terrorists responsible for the explosion.
According to the Palestinian Wafa news agency, forces also surrounded the nearby town of Udala.
On Wednesday, IDF troops conducted several raids in Nablus and Bethlehem, according to Wafa.
Israel increased the volume and intensity of its military activity in Judea and Samaria following the outbreak of war between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza Strip on Oct. 7, 2023. On that day, as many as 6,000 Hamas terrorists invaded southern Israel, murdering some 1,200 people and abducting another 251 into Gaza, where 59 remain.
Israel responded with a ground invasion into Gaza to topple the Hamas regime there but also cracked down on its activity, and that of other terrorist groups, in Judea and Samaria. In that area, more than 930 Palestinians have been killed since Oct. 7, 2023, the vast majority of them terrorists, and more than 15,000 have been arrested, according to Tel Aviv University’s Institute for National Security Studies.
Of those arrested, some 38% belonged to Hamas. The volume of arrests constituted a 129% increase over the corresponding months before the massacre.
Terrorists in Judea and Samaria have killed 64 Israelis since Oct. 7, 2023, and wounded another 477 in more than 8,200 separate terrorist attacks.
