Israeli commandos disguised as medical workers and Muslim women burst into a hospital in the occupied West Bank yesterday and killed three Palestinian fighters, one of them lying paralysed in bed, witnesses and authorities said.
The Israeli military said the three fighters were killed in a joint undercover operation by the army, Shin Bet security service and border police in the Ibn Sina hospital in Jenin, in the West Bank.
It identified one of the men as Mohamed Walid Jalamna, a Hamas member.
The military said the two others, the brothers Basel al-Ghazzawi and Mohamed al-Ghazzawi, belonged to the Jenin Brigade and the armed wing of Islamic Jihad.
The Palestinian health ministry confirmed the deaths and called on the UN to guarantee protection for health centres. “The occupation is committing a new massacre inside hospitals,” it said in a statement.
CCTV footage from the hospital showed a group of about 10 people, dressed variously in civilian clothes and medical garb and including three in headscarves and women’s clothing, pacing through a corridor, armed with assault rifles and moving into the hospital.
The hospital’s director, Dr Naji Nazzal said the Israeli team had entered the hospital at around 5.30am (0330 GMT) and made its way stealthily to the third floor, ringing the bell to enter the ward where the men were sleeping.
“They executed the three men as they slept in the room,” he told Reuters. Hours later, a bloodied blue hospital pillow pierced by a bullet remained on a bed, while a folding bed nearby was also stained with blood, apparently from a shot to the head. Nazzal said Basil Ayman al-Ghazzawi had been receiving treatment since Oct 25 for a spinal injury which had paralysed him.
The Islamic Jihad fighter group said the al-Ghazzawi brothers were members of its armed wing, while Hamas confirmed that Jalamna belonged to its Al Qassam Brigade.
The dramatic operation in the early hours of the morning was the latest in a series of incidents in the West Bank, which has seen an explosion of violence since the Hamas-led storming of Israel in the first week of October.
Jenin, in the northern part of the West Bank, has witnessed some of the biggest clashes, with repeated Israeli attacks on the densely packed Palestinian refugee camp adjoining the city.
Thousands of mourners poured into the streets of the camp during the day as the three men killed in the raid were buried.