What's happening in West Bank's Nur Shams refugee camp?

This week, the Israeli military intensified attacks in the occupied West Bank. On Wednesday, they targeted the Nur Shams refugee camp in the northern West Bank city of Tulkarem, with a series of explosions.

Earlier in the week, Israeli forces ordered Palestinian residents to evacuate the area amid a military offensive. According to reports, the Israeli army used loudspeakers and ordered Palestinians to leave their homes in the camp which was established in 1952.

Witnesses claimed that Palestinians leaving the camp were searched and interrogated by Israeli forces before being allowed to depart.

The army raided the camp on Sunday, in the latest escalation in the northern West Bank amid military operations that have killed more than 30 people and displaced thousands since January 21.

According to Relief Web, on the day of the raid, Israeli forces shot and killed a Palestinian man and injured four others, including a child, in Nur Shams. Exchanges of fire between armed Palestinians and Israeli forces were reported during the incident.

On the same day, Israeli forces shot and killed two Palestinian women, one of whom was eight months pregnant, while injuring two men.

According to local sources, the pregnant woman and her husband attempted to leave the camp in search of a secure location and were both shot in the head, which killed the woman and her unborn child and injured her husband.

The second woman was killed by shrapnel and her father was injured when Israeli forces used explosives to enter a home in the camp.

In recent months, violence in the occupied West Bank has surged, exacerbated by the ongoing war in Gaza. According to the Doctors Without Borders aid group, the Israeli onslaught in Jenin and Tulkarem in the northern West Bank has displaced over 38,000 Palestinians.

Since January 19, violence in the occupied West Bank has escalated following a ceasefire and prisoner exchange deal in Gaza—an agreement reached after more than a year of Israeli bombardment that has claimed nearly 48,200 Palestinian lives.

The war, which began on October 7, 2023, has also seen Israeli forces and settlers kill at least 910 Palestinians across the occupied West Bank, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry.

In July 2024, the International Court of Justice declared Israel’s decades-long occupation of Palestinian land illegal and demanded the evacuation of all existing settlements in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem.

Last October, the Israeli army demolished the office of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees in the Nur Shams refugee camp.

“Israeli bulldozers brought down the building, through which the UN agency runs the daily needs of residents,” said Nehad al Shaweeh, who heads a local service committee in the camp.

“The building was partially damaged during previous Israeli raids and today it was completely demolished by Israeli forces,” he added.

What to expect next?

Sunday’s raid could provoke further retaliatory attacks, worsening the cycle of violence between the Palestinians and Israeli forces.

In addition to the violence, the infrastructure damage and displacement, are worsening living conditions for thousands of Palestinians.

As the situation unfolds, the West Bank remains a flashpoint, with Nur Shams now a critical focus of conflict.