JERUSALEM, Israel – Israel Police arrested three people on Wednesday following reports that a group of masked Israelis living in a West Bank settlement community attacked a Palestinian village with stones, injuring more than a dozen Palestinians, including a three-year-old boy.
The three suspects include two men from Jerusalem and a minor from South Hebron Hills, located in the West Bank – biblical Judea and Samaria. The suspects are being investigated “on suspicion of assault, causing damage to property and sabotage,” the police said in a statement.
Israelis with scarves wrapped around their faces hurled rocks at Palestinian homes and vehicles in the shepherding village of al-Mufaqara, Palestinian and Israeli witnesses said.
“It must have been around 100 settlers, from all the outposts near al-Mufaqara. They smashed windows, punctured car tires, entered homes. And they injured a child as they hurled stones into his home,” local resident Basil al-Adra, who witnessed the scene, told Israeli media. The toddler was hospitalized for his injuries.
Some of the Palestinians threw rocks back, sparking clashes between the two sides, according to Hebrew media reports.
Palestinian witnesses said Israeli soldiers fired tear gas and stun grenades at them, but not the Israelis. Israel’s military declined to comment on the allegations
Israeli police described the event as a “friction incident” and said two Palestinians and one Israeli were arrested on Tuesday.
Israeli Foreign Minister Yair Lapid called it an act of “terror.”
“This violent incident, is horrific and it is terror. This isn’t the Israeli way and it isn’t the Jewish way. This is a violent and dangerous fringe and we have a responsibility to bring them to justice,” said Lapid.
Hebron Hills council head Yochai Damari said in a statement that the Israelis who were involved in the clashes were “guests, not [local] residents, who say stones were thrown at them.”
“Our way is not violence. Not against soldiers and not against Arabs,” Damari said. He added that Palestinians also provoke clashes by “rioting and collaborating with anarchists.”
The incident was also condemned by the European Union and United Nations.
Some residents of Israeli settlements have been known to commit “price tag” attacks against Palestinian communities. Perpetrators say they’re in retaliation for attacks against Jews.
Rights groups lament that Israeli police rarely arrest Jewish perpetrators.
Israeli Health Minister Nitzan Horowitz said Tuesday that “the violent rampage of lawbreakers is intolerable and we will stop it.”
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