By Elizabeth Sykes

An Israeli woman was shot and killed and a man seriously injured in a drive-by shooting on the main north-south road in the West Bank last Monday, recently after two other Israelis were shot and killed the previous Saturday. 

According to The Associated Press, the woman killed was identified as Batsheva Nigri, a mother of three and a kindergarten teacher, who lived in Beit Hagai, a Jewish settlement near the occupied West-Bank city of Hebron.

An Israeli rescue service reported that the woman’s 12-year-old daughter, who was also in the car, was unharmed. The driver was found semi-conscious and taken to the hospital.

The latest attack is part of a recent rapid rise in skirmishes involving Palestinian militants, radical Jewish settlers, and Israeli security forces. 

Afterward on the same day, eight Palestinians were injured during an Israeli army raid near the city of Nablus, with one in critical condition with a gunshot wound to the head, after hundreds of Palestinians protested near the border fence with Israel. Israel also carried out a raid to search for the gunman who had carried out the previous attack on Saturday, killing a father and son at a car wash in Huwara in the northern West Bank, said Al Jazeera. 

Since the start of 2023, 180 Palestinians have been killed by Israel in the West Bank, according to The Associated Press. Another tally estimated at least 218 Palestinians killed. Around 30 Israelis have been killed by Palestinian attacks against Israelis during that same time. Israel says most of the Palestinians killed were militants, but young protesters and bystanders have also been harmed.

After the drive-by shooting on Monday, the military shut down all entrances to the Palestinian city of Hebron along with other nearby southern and eastern towns and prompted the second search by Israeli security in under a week after the gunman fled.

The Israeli army has launched several high-profile raids into Palestinian refugee camps recently as well. Israel has said the raids are meant to dismantle militant networks and thwart future attacks, but the fatality numbers against Palestinians is much higher than the militants. 

The armed group Al Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades claimed responsibility for the shooting. The group is linked to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’s Fatah party.

After visiting the site of the shooting, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned Israel was “in the midst of a terror attack” that was “encouraged, guided, funded by Iran and its satellite states.”

In a response to the attack as well, Israel’s National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir called on Netanyahu to place checkpoints, enforce blockades, and deny work permits to Palestinians in order to return to the policy of targeted assassinations in the West Bank.

According to Haaretz News, the Palestinian Islamic Jihad group Hamas spokesman Hazem Qassem said in a press statement the Hawara shooting was  “a natural and legitimate response to the crimes of the occupation and its settlers’ aggression against our people.” 

The mix of Palestinians carrying out attacks on Israeli civilians as well as almost nightly raids by the Israeli army to arrest militants has fueled some of the worst fighting in the West Bank in nearly two decades.

According to the Ahram news agency, Israel has occupied the West Bank since the Six-Day War of 1967, and other than the annexed east Jerusalem, the West Bank still houses three million Palestinians. Around 490,000 Israelis live in settlements that are considered illegal under international law. 

The disparity in casualties brought on by the Israeli  side is deeply concerning, especially because of the United States’ support for Israel despite the United Nations’ condemnation of the country’s aggressions. The fight for the holy land continues to be an issue for three of the world’s major religions, with no clear resolution. The bloodbath from Israeli military backlash that has increased in recent months, however, should be minimized as much as possible for the benefit of all civilians in the West Bank.