The Palestinian Ministry of Health reported in its latest report that three of the fatalities were minors and ten of the injured were in serious condition.
The organization identified the deceased as Samih Firas Abu al-Wafa, 20 years old; Husam Mohammad Abu Deibeh, 18; Avs Hani Hanoun, 19; Nour Eddin Husam Marshoud, 16; Mohammad Muhannad al-Shami, 23; Ahmad Mohammad Amer, 21; Majdi Ararawi, 17, and Ali Hani al-Ghoul, 17.
This morning, Israeli security forces launched their largest military operation in the West Bank in years.
The official Palestinian news agency Wafa denounced that after the first drone fire, a large contingent of soldiers and about 150 military vehicles, including bulldozers, entered Jenin and its camp with various weapons.
The uniformed men blocked the roads connecting the two cities and deployed scores of snipers on the rooftops, he added.
The Palestinian Ministry of Information denounced that the soldiers attacked the journalists covering the attack.
The occupying forces opened fire on al-Arabi TV reporter Amid Shehadeh and cameraman Rabi Munir, it said.
Five other communicators drew attention to being trapped in a house in the refugee camp for more than two hours and being attacked by the military.
The Tel Aviv army justified the operation by fighting Palestinian militias, which were very active in the region and whose members they labeled terrorists.
The Arab League and several countries in the region strongly condemned the offensive.
“We hold the occupying state responsible for these war crimes, which violate numerous international laws,” the pan-Arab organization’s secretary-general, Ahmed Aboul Gheit, warned in a statement.
This operation undermines any efforts to resume negotiations and therefore buries hopes for peace in the region, he said.
The Arab parliament, which viewed the offensive as collective punishment against the civilian population, judged similarly.
Egypt joined the wave of condemnation by dismissing repeated Israeli attacks on Palestinian towns and cities in clear “violations of international law”.
For its part, Jordan’s Ministry of Foreign and Expatriate Affairs called on the international community to take action to halt the military operation.
UN Humanitarian Coordinator for the Palestinian Territories Lynn Hastings said she was alarmed by the scale of the Israeli attack.
“Airstrikes took place in the densely populated refugee camp. “Several dead and seriously injured,” the official wrote on Twitter.
Both the government and the Palestinian parties condemned the new offensive, calling it a war crime.
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