Israeli forces’ brutal attack on the Jenin camp started on Monday, with the regime’s forces making the camp and the entire city of Jenin target of their incessant land and aerial assaults.
So far, more than 10 Palestinians have lost their lives and scores of others have been injured in the barbaric offensive, whose main focus is the Jenin refugee camp.
Palestinian media said the Israeli warplanes bombed a neighborhood near Abdullah Azzam Mosque in the Jenin refugee camp, with plumes of smoke rising into the sky from the site.
Palestine’s Shehab news agency reported that the occupation forces fired gas bombs at the hospital in Jenin, which was retaliated by Palestinians hurling handmade explosives at Israeli military vehicles in front of the medical facility.
According to a statement by the Palestinian Red Crescent on Monday, Israeli troops have forced hundreds of families in the Jenin camp to leave their homes in preparation for demolishing them in order to reach the resistance fighters.
The statement confirmed the evacuation of about 500 families from inside the Jenin camp, adding, “We are facing difficulty in moving inside the camp as roads are closed due to the destruction” caused by Israel’s attack.
It said a total of 3,000 Palestinian citizens have been evacuated from Jenin so far, and the number is increasing, as Israeli authorities are threatening to destroy the entire camp.
Palestinian citizens leaving their homes say the regime’s forces had threatened to target them if they refused to go, and some of them said Israeli forces fired live shots at them while they were inside their homes.
According to Palestinian media reports, as the camp’s residents were leaving, Israeli forces used gas bombs against them.
The mayor of Jenin told Palestinian outlets that the Israeli army is deliberately demolishing houses in the Jenin camp after displacing their residents and the extent of the destruction is large.
Reacting to the regime’s inhumane moves, the Palestinian Foreign Ministry issued a statement, strongly condemning “the crime of expelling and displacing Palestinian families in the Jenin camp from their homes under flimsy security pretexts.”
Meanwhile, the Palestinian factions’ coordination committee announced a day of general strike on Tuesday, which will be observed by all walks of life. It added that there will also be a large rally at noon “to support our people who are subjected to a massacre in the city and camp of Jenin.”
A senior official of the Islamic Jihad movement said the forcible expulsion of Palestinian citizens from their homes is part of Israel’s so-called transfer project, which the occupying regime seeks to implement in the West Bank.
In another development on Monday, the Palestinian Authority (PA), which is headquartered in the occupied West Bank city of Ramallah, called on the international community to take steps to protect Palestinians amid the Israeli aggression and impose sanctions against the regime, while condemning “the ongoing terrorist aggression against Jenin and its refugee camp.”
“I directed the government and its agencies to provide everything necessary to strengthen the steadfastness of our people in Jenin…,” PA President Mahmoud Abbas said while calling on the Palestinian people “to stand firm and steadfast in these difficult moments.”
He also urged all Palestinian factions to unite “and defend the Palestinian people’s land, sanctities, and legitimate rights to freedom and independence.”
MNA/PressTV