Israeli forces raid Nablus hospital, arrest injured Palestinian patient

Israeli security forces surround a bullet-riddled bus following a reported attack at an intersection close to the settlement of Ariel, near Nablus in the occupied West Bank. Photo / AFP

The Palestinian health ministry in the occupied West Bank on Wednesday condemned a raid by Israeli forces on a hospital in Nablus and the arrest of an injured patient.

Israeli authorities confirmed the raid on Wednesday evening, in which they apprehended a Palestinian injured in an Israeli strike the day before.

In a statement, the ministry called the raid “a flagrant violation of all international laws and conventions that stipulate the protection of treatment centres and patients”.

The detained Palestinian is from near Tubas in the northern West Bank, where he was targeted in an Israeli strike on Tuesday that the Israeli military said killed three other Palestinians.

Medical sources confirmed the man’s identity to AFP and that he was injured in the strike.

In a joint statement, the Israeli military, the Shin Bet security service and the Israeli police announced they had arrested the man at a hospital in Nablus.

They accused him of being “the third member of a terrorist cell that carried out the shooting attack” at Mehola junction in August in which an Israeli was killed. They also accused him of planning to carry out further attacks and posing “an imminent threat to Israeli civilians”.

The Palestinian health ministry called on “international institutions” and the Red Cross to “intervene immediately to stop the occupation’s attacks on treatment centres and staff, demanding immediate protection for the health system and all its components”.

The Israeli organisations said: “The security forces will continue to operate wherever necessary to thwart terrorism in the area and to maintain the safety of Israeli civilians.”

- Agence France-Presse