Israeli settlers rampage through Nablus-district town

Dozens of Israeli settlers today rampaged through Burqa town, north of Nablus, torching and indiscriminately opening fire towards houses, according to a local activist.

Ghassan Daghlas, who monitors Israel’s colonial settlement activities in the northern West Bank, said that scores of armed settlers descended on the West Bank town, indiscriminately opening live fire towards the residents, attacking houses at the town entrance and setting a shack on fire.

The residents attempted to fend off the settler attack and managed to put off the fire, however, faced with such a situation, they made a distress call, calling on Palestinians in the surrounding villages and towns to help them repel the settler attack and competent authorities dispatch ambulances and fire-fighting vehicles.

This followed the killing of an Israeli settler in a shooting attack near the evacuated colonial settlement outpost of Homesh, north of Nablus, on Thursday night.

The incident comes a few days after Israeli forces shot and killed a Palestinian man in the city of Nablus following a raid on his home, while two other Palestinians were wounded after being run down by an Israeli military vehicle, according to the Palestinian Red Crescent Society.

Last week, Israeli forces killed a Palestinian and wounded 70 others in Beita, a village in Nablus, during a protest against Israeli settlements in the West Bank.

Settler violence against Palestinians and their property is routine in the West Bank and is rarely prosecuted by Israeli authorities.

Settler violence includes property and mosque arsons, stone-throwing, uprooting of crops and olive trees, attacks on vulnerable homes, among others.

There are over 700,000 Israeli settlers living in colonial settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.

Source: Palestinian News & Info Agency