JERUSALEM – Three Israeli soldiers were detained on Monday after allegedly hurling an improvised bomb at Palestinians near the West Bank city of Bethlehem in retaliation for the seizure of a teenager’s body last week.
According to the Israeli Defense Forces, Palestinian gunmen seized the body of an Israeli Druze high-schooler from a hospital in the town of Jenin where he had been taken after a car accident on Wednesday in the occupied West Bank, which has seen an increase in violence since March.
The incident raised hopes that the military would launch an operation to recover the teenager’s body. However, it was quietly returned after about 30 hours of negotiations that, according to a diplomat, included the United Nations.
The gunmen did not state their motivation, but Palestinians demonstrated the same day in Jenin, demanding the release of their relatives’ remains, which they claimed Israel was holding. The Druze are an Arab community in Israel, with members serving in the country’s armed forces.
The Israeli military said in a statement that it had launched an investigation into the attack on Palestinians near Bethlehem by Israeli Druze soldiers on Monday, but that it could not provide any additional information.
Benny Gantz, Israel’s defense minister, said that if the incident was an act of vengeance, the military would be dealing with a “serious incident that requires accountability.”
“Israeli soldiers do not take the law into their own hands and exact vengeance,” Gantz wrote on Twitter.
Source: Reuters