
Israeli paramedics carrying rifles at the site of the shooting operation
(Photo Credit: Quds News Network)
Four Israelis and a Palestinian were injured in a shooting operation on the evening of 29 October in the Kiryat Arba settlement of the West Bank city of Hebron, with the attack resulting in the death of one settler.
One of the injured Israelis remains in critical condition.
The shooter, identified as 35-year-old Mohammad al-Jabari, was run down by an Israeli police vehicle twice as he was still firing shots. After being hit by the car, Jabari exchanged fire with the occupation forces before being shot dead.
مشاهد من عملية الخليل التي نفذها محمد الجعبري وأدت لمقتل مستوطن وإصابة آخرين بجروح خطيرة. pic.twitter.com/fI6LQfwnDs
— غزة الحدث الإخبارية (@24newspal) October 29, 2022
Jabari was a member of the Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of the Hamas resistance movement. He was also a father of two children, and a teacher at the Jawad Al-Hashlamoun Basic School in the Hebron Education Directorate.
“We mourn the martyr and educator Muhammad Kamel Al-Jabari … who was shot dead by the occupation,” the Palestinian Ministry of Education said in a statement.
The operation itself targeted the home of far-right, Israeli extremist MK and leader in the Otzma Yehudit party, Itamar Ben Gvir.
“My family is currently secured [as we come] under a shooting attack on our home,” Ben Gvir said via Twitter as the operation was taking place. While speaking on the phone with Hebrew Channel 12 media outlet, he said that he wasn’t at home at the time of the shooting, but that his family was.
משפחתי נמצאת כרגע מאובטחת תחת מתקפת יריות על ביתנו בגבעת האבות. נשמעים לכוחות הביטחון.
— איתמר בן גביר (@itamarbengvir) October 29, 2022
The following day, Ben Gvir offered his condolences via Twitter to the family of the dead settler, who was identified as 49-year-old Ronen Hanania.
קיבלתי בצער ובלב כבד את הידיעה על הירצחו של רונן חנניה הי"ד בפיגוע הנורא אמש בחברון. כל חטאו היה רק כי הוא יהודי. בשעה קשה זו שולח תנחומים ומשתתף בצערם הכבד של בני המשפחה. pic.twitter.com/vvkql1Q8ji
— איתמר בן גביר (@itamarbengvir) October 30, 2022
Following the shooting, massive Palestinian rallies celebrating the operation were held in the Gaza Strip, as well as across the occupied West Bank.
Hamas spokesman, Hazem Qassem, said in a statement following the operation: “The bullets of the resistance are a practical response to Zionist settlement expansion, and the crimes they are committing,” adding that the operation “proves that the resistance front can surprise the occupiers.”
The Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) resistance faction and the leftist Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) also praised the operation.
The day after the attack, on 30 October, the Israeli army made preparations for the punitive demolition of Jabari’s home – a popular form of collective punishment deployed by the occupation.
The shooting operation represents a highly significant increase in resistance activity across the West Bank recently, which comes as a result of constant Israeli violence and oppression of Palestinians.