Netanyahu Orders Hebron Siege, Evictions After Checkpoint Firefight

Israeli forces opened fire on two men at a temporary checkpoint outside Hebron on Friday after their car, bearing Israeli plates, was stopped. The exchange lasted 20 minutes and ended with both gunmen dead. The Israeli military said the pair carried an assault rifle and a handgun. Two soldiers were killed and three others wounded.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu responded by announcing a siege on Hebron and the neighbouring town of Halhul. He said residents of the gunmen's home neighbourhoods would be forced out and pledged mass demolitions of homes. Netanyahu also said plans existed for the largest military operation in the West Bank since 1967, adding that no date had been set but that it was "on the way". Hebron is the largest Palestinian city in the occupied West Bank, with about 250,000 residents.

Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich posted a video showing a bulldozer tearing down a Palestinian home near the firefight site. He said the structure lacked permits and that the demolition was meant to "create deterrence and exact a price". No connection was claimed between the owners and the attackers. Hours later, Israel's high court issued a temporary order stopping further demolitions after lawyer Mohammed Dahleh filed an urgent petition on behalf of two nearby factory owners.

Dahleh argued the demolition breached international law on collective punishment as well as Israeli administrative law. "What we saw today was an attempt to copy the illegal practices used in Gaza, in the heart of the West Bank," he said. Michael Sfard, an Israeli lawyer, called Smotrich's video a "direct admission" that the demolitions amounted to collective punishment.

Defence Minister Israel Katz said further mass demolitions and forced displacement would follow, comparing the plan to Gaza and to the Jenin refugee camp, where nearly 20,000 people have left their homes. "Every clan neighbourhood in Hebron from which the terrorists emerged today will be evacuated of its residents," Katz said. National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir traveled to Hebron on Friday and called for the Palestinian Authority to be dismantled and for tighter limits on Palestinian movement.

The attack took place a week before Tuesday's elections, when polls suggest the governing far-right coalition may lose its majority. Since the Hamas-led attacks of 7 October 2023, more than 1,100 people have been killed in the occupied West Bank by Israeli forces or settlers. An AFP photographer who witnessed the checkpoint exchange later faced conspiracy theories shared by prominent Israelis, including a candidate for the far-right Amcha Yisrael party. The Foreign Press Association called the claims "dangerous and defamatory".

The episode followed an incident a week earlier in which settlers severely injured photographer Heidi Levine while she documented attacks on Palestinians harvesting olives. Attacks have intensified since the olive harvest began in late September.