Sources reported that an Israeli force stormed the office, planted explosives, and then withdrew and detonated it. They also forced several families living nearby to evacuate their homes. The movement did not immediately comment on the incident.
In a related context, Israeli forces stormed Balata camp at dawn and spread out in a number of alleys and the market street, amid the sound of explosions. They also carried out raids in villages and towns in the governorates of Ramallah, Jenin and Bethlehem, without reporting any arrests, according to the Palestinian News Agency (WAFA).
Wafa reported that a 59-year-old man was shot in the foot with live ammunition near the separation wall in the Dar Salah area, east of Bethlehem, according to the Red Crescent Society, and was taken to the hospital.
Palestinian data indicates that attacks in the West Bank since October 2023 have resulted in the martyrdom of at least 1,112 Palestinians, the injury of about 11,500, and the arrest of about 22,000, amid escalating killings, arrests, displacement, and settlement expansion.
Politically, Palestinian Prime Minister Mohammad Mustafa, in his speech before the 39th African Union Summit in Addis Ababa, called for a decisive international response to Israeli actions and settlement expansion in the Palestinian territories, stressing that this has become a necessity to protect the two-state solution.
He said that Israel continues to violate the ceasefire agreement in the Gaza Strip and threatens its second phase, stressing that the Strip is an integral part of the State of Palestine.
Mustafa pointed out that the Israeli government recently approved decisions aimed at strengthening control over the West Bank, including expanding its monitoring and enforcement powers to include areas classified as “A” and “B”, which allows for the implementation of demolition and confiscation operations against Palestinian properties even in areas under the administrative and security control of the Palestinian Authority.
The United Nations and the international community consider the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, to be occupied territory, and deem Israeli settlement activity there illegal.
On the financial front, Mustafa said that Israel is withholding about 70% of Palestinian tax revenues (clearance funds), which has exacerbated the PA’s financial crisis and hindered its ability to pay its employees’ salaries in full. He explained that these funds are taxes on goods imported into the Palestinian territories, which Israel collects on behalf of the PA, but uses them as a tool of political pressure through deductions and withholding.
Since 2019, Israel began deducting amounts from Palestinian clearance funds under various pretexts, and then stopped transferring them nine months ago, which plunged the Palestinian Authority into a continuous financial crisis that made it unable to pay its employees' salaries in full.
