Israel Orders West Bank Operation Citing Six Day War Scale

Israeli bulldozers began flattening homes in Hebron on Friday afternoon, forcing hundreds of Palestinian residents to leave their neighborhood. The military action followed a fatal attack on an Israeli checkpoint nearby. The conflict has escalated into a planned military operation that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu described as unprecedented in scale since the Six Day War of 1967.

Netanyahu delivered a televised address from the site of the shooting. He stated that Israel would act to demolish the area and change it completely. The prime minister compared the planned operation to last year's assault on two refugee camps in the northern West Bank. That earlier campaign displaced tens of thousands of people. Human Rights Watch characterized those expulsions as war crimes, a charge Israel rejects.

The Israeli military reported that soldiers were behind concrete barriers when two gunmen opened fire. The firefight lasted approximately 20 minutes. Soldiers killed the attackers. Two soldiers died and three others were wounded in the exchange.

B'Tselem, an Israeli human rights group, urged foreign governments to intervene. The organization warned against another wave of ethnic cleansing and war crimes. The United Nations Human Rights Office for the occupied Palestinian territory described the current situation as a new level of dehumanization. Israel has imposed widespread closures in Hebron, the most populous city in the occupied West Bank. The territory currently features 925 checkpoints, roadblocks, and other barriers that restrict movement.

The military response is occurring ahead of national elections scheduled for October 27. Polls show Prime Minister Netanyahu and his rival, Gadi Eisenkot, in a close race. Neither leader currently holds enough support to form a government. Analysts argue that Netanyahu is using the crisis to project strength to voters.

Danny Citrinowicz, a senior researcher at the Institute for National Security Studies in Tel Aviv, said Netanyahu positions himself as a security leader. Citrinowicz noted that the prime minister is taking harsh measures to demonstrate that he defends the public. He described the eviction of families from the attackers' neighborhood as collective punishment because there is no evidence linking them to the gunmen.

Citrinowicz argued that preventing future attacks requires giving people hope rather than punishing communities. He advised authorities to arrest those who plan attacks while supporting those who seek stability and a working economy. The immediate goal of the operation is to alter the physical landscape of the Hebron neighborhood where the shooting occurred.