IDF troops on Saturday demolished the home of one of two Palestinian terrorists who carried out a shooting attack in Jerusalem earlier this month that killed six people, the military said.
Overnight, the IDF said, troops operated in the West Bank town of Qubeiba, near Ramallah, and razed the house of Muthanna Amro, 20.
Amro carried out the attack at Jerusalem’s Ramot Junction on September 6, along with Mohammad Taha, 21, from the nearby town of Qatanna.
The military intends to demolish Taha’s home as well, and has already surveyed it and sealed it shut in the interim.
Qubeiba mayor Nafiz Hamouda said the military had notified residents 10 days earlier of its intention to demolish the property.
“Last night they came, and at dawn today the house was blown up,” he said.
The blast also caused significant damage to four or five neighboring houses, Hamouda said.
“This is the nature of the occupation. It does not stop at harming one individual, but seeks to inflict damage on as many citizens as possible,” he criticized.
The Palestinian Authority’s official news agency, Wafa, reported that a large military force entered the town, surrounded the house and evacuated nearby residents before detonating the building.
As a matter of policy, Israel demolishes the homes of Palestinians accused of carrying out deadly terror attacks. Israeli officials have said the policy is intended to dissuade Palestinians from planning terror attacks, as doing so will harm their extended families’ livelihood. Critics have called it collective punishment.
“Collective punishment is prohibited under both Israeli law and international humanitarian law. Such actions are war crimes,” Association for Civil Rights in Israel (ACRI) wrote to Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara after the military sealed the two terrorists’ homes prior to their demolition. “We ask you to instruct the Defense Ministry and the army to immediately cease committing war crimes.”
The Attorney General’s Office declined to comment on the letter.
Violence has surged in the West Bank since the Gaza war began with the Hamas-led October 7, 2023, attacks in southern Israel. According to the Palestinian Authority health ministry, nearly 1,000 West Bank Palestinians have been killed in that time.
The IDF says the vast majority of them were gunmen killed in exchanges of fire, rioters who clashed with troops, or terrorists carrying out attacks.
During the same period, 61 people, including Israeli security personnel, have been killed in terror attacks in Israel and the West Bank. Another eight members of the security forces were killed in clashes with terror operatives in the West Bank.