Palestinians killed in West Bank as world leaders try to avoid regional war

Five Palestinians were killed, including four teenagers, and another seven were wounded by Israeli fire during military raids in the occupied West Bank, Palestinian officials said Tuesday, as world leaders try to stop tensions in the Middle East from boiling over into a regional war.

The Lebanese militant group Hezbollah said it launched a drone attack early Monday on northern Israel that the Israeli military said wounded two Israeli troops.

The violence came amid fears of an all-out regional war following the previous week’s killings of a senior Hezbollah commander in Lebanon and Hamas’ top political leader in Iran.

Israel and Hezbollah have exchanged near-daily strikes for the past 10 months during the war in Gaza.

Leaders in Egypt and Turkey say they are exhausting all avenues possible to prevent the Israel-Hamas war from becoming a wider regional conflict.

But Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told his Cabinet over the weekend that Israel is already in a “multi-front war” with Iran and its proxies.

The head of Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard threatened Israel on Monday over the assassination of Haniyeh, warning that Israel was “digging its own grave” with its actions against Hamas.

Israel’s defense minister says the military is ready for a “swift transition to offense.”

Here’s the latest:

5 Palestinians are killed and 7 wounded in Israeli raids in the West Bank

RAMALLAH, West Bank — Palestinian officials say five Palestinians were killed, including four teenagers, and another seven were wounded by Israeli fire during military raids in the occupied West Bank.

The Palestinian Health Ministry said Tuesday that four people, including two 19-year-olds and a 14-year-old, were killed in an overnight raid in the village of Aqaaba in the northern West Bank.

It said an 18-year-old was killed in a separate raid in Jenin — a frequent flashpoint — where the Islamic Jihad militant group reported heavy fighting with the army.

There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military.

Israel has carried out near-daily military raids across the West Bank since Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack out of Gaza triggered the ongoing war there. Palestinians from the West Bank have also carried out a number of attacks on Israelis.

The Health Ministry says over 600 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli fire in the West Bank since the start of the war. Most were killed during military arrest raids and violent protests.

Israel captured the West Bank, along with Gaza and east Jerusalem, in the 1967 Mideast war. The Palestinians want all three territories for their future state.

The 3 million Palestinians in the West Bank live under seemingly open-ended Israeli military rule, with the Western-backed Palestinian Authority exercising limited control over population centers. 

Over 500,000 Jewish settlers, who live in scores of settlements across the territory that most of the international community views as illegal or illegitimate, have Israeli citizenship.

Australia’s prime minister condemns Iranian ambassador’s comments on social media as ‘abhorrent’

SYDNEY — Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese on Tuesday condemned as “abhorrent” an Iranian ambassador’s social media comment on Israel.

Albanese said Ambassador Ahmad Sadeghi had been called in for a meeting with Australia’s Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade officials over his recent post on the social media platform X.

Sadeghi cites Hamas spiritual leader Ahmed Yassin advocating that “wiping out the Zionist plague out of the holy lands of Palestine happens no later than 2027.” Sadeghi added: “Looking forward to such a heavenly & divine promise Inshaa-Allah.” The Arabic expression means “if God wills.”

Albanese told reporters: “I make it clear: There’s no place for the sort of comments that were made online on social media by the Iranian ambassador.”

“They’re abhorrent. And they are hateful, they are antisemitic and they have no place,” Albanese added.

Asked by a reporters if the ambassador should be expelled from Australia, Albanese did not directly answer.

The Iranian Embassy in Australia later told The Associated Press in an email that Sadeghi’s post “has nothing to do with Jewish People, anti-Semitism or raising hate speech or violent ways.”