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Thousands of Palestinians March against Nablus Massacre

Clashes between Palestinians and Israeli soldiers near Nablus on Friday. (AFP)
Clashes between Palestinians and Israeli soldiers near Nablus on Friday. (AFP)
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Thousands of Palestinians March against Nablus Massacre

Clashes between Palestinians and Israeli soldiers near Nablus on Friday. (AFP)
Clashes between Palestinians and Israeli soldiers near Nablus on Friday. (AFP)

Thousands of Palestinians furious over deadly Israeli raids in Nablus this week held midnight marches on Friday throughout the West Bank.

Protesters took to the streets in response to a call for demonstrations by the Lion’s Den group.

Clashes ensued between the protesters and Israeli forces that tried to disperse them. Dozens of Palestinians were wounded.

A group of armed settlers from a nearby outpost descended on the village of Qusra and Palestinians went into the street to see what was happening late Thursday, said Ghassan Douglas, the Palestinian official who monitors Israeli settlements in the Nablus region.

After midnight, one of the settlers opened fire at the residents, hitting one man in the stomach and another in the thigh. Douglas said the shooting was unprovoked.

According to the Palestinian Ministry of Health, the two injuries were serious.

The Lion’s Den called on Thursday Palestinians to take to the streets to show loyalty to the 11 martyrs of the Nablus massacre committed by Israeli forces.

Meanwhile, retired Israeli commander Lt. Col. Yaron Buskila commented that the third intifada has begun.

“The path of this intifada could lead to the collapse of the Palestinian Authority if Israel fails to take adequate deterrence measures,” he warned.

Nablus was the scene of an Israeli military raid that set off a fierce gunbattle on Wednesday, killing several Palestinians, including two men aged 72 and 61, and a 16-year-old boy, and wounded scores of others. Palestinian militant groups claimed six of the dead as members.

The bloodshed extended one of the deadliest periods in years in the West Bank, where dozens of Palestinians have been killed by Israeli fire since the start of the year. Palestinian attacks on Israelis in 2023 have killed 11 people.

Following Friday prayers at the Dome of the Rock Mosque in the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound in the Old City of Jerusalem, Palestinians chanted and protested against the deadly raid in Nablus, as well as a crackdown on Palestinian prisoners by Israel’s right-wing government.

The northern West Bank in particular has seen a surge of settler attacks. Many villages in the area have gradually become sandwiched between settlements and unauthorized outposts that house particularly ideological settlers.

Last month, leading Israeli human rights group B'Tselem recorded a string of incidents near Nablus — from settlers attacking Palestinians with stones in Qusra to torching Palestinian cars in Aqraba. Earlier this month, a settler shot and killed a Palestinian in the farming town of Salfit.

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Arab World

Nearly 30% of Syrians Want to Go Home, up from Almost Zero, UN Refugee Chief Says

This handout picture released by the official Syrian Arab News Agency (SANA) shows Syria's de factor leader Ahmed al-Sharaa (R) receiving United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi (L) in Damascus on January 25, 2025. (SANA / AFP)
This handout picture released by the official Syrian Arab News Agency (SANA) shows Syria's de factor leader Ahmed al-Sharaa (R) receiving United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi (L) in Damascus on January 25, 2025. (SANA / AFP)
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Nearly 30% of Syrians Want to Go Home, up from Almost Zero, UN Refugee Chief Says

This handout picture released by the official Syrian Arab News Agency (SANA) shows Syria's de factor leader Ahmed al-Sharaa (R) receiving United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi (L) in Damascus on January 25, 2025. (SANA / AFP)
This handout picture released by the official Syrian Arab News Agency (SANA) shows Syria's de factor leader Ahmed al-Sharaa (R) receiving United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi (L) in Damascus on January 25, 2025. (SANA / AFP)

Almost 30% of the millions of Syrian refugees living in Middle Eastern countries want to return home in the next year, following the fall of President Bashar al-Assad, up from almost none last year, the head of the UN's refugee agency said.

The shift is based on an assessment done by the UN in January, weeks after Assad was ousted by opposition factions, bringing an abrupt end to a 13-year civil war that had created one of the biggest refugee crises of modern times.

"We have seen the needle move, finally, after years of decline," Filippo Grandi told a small group of reporters in Damascus, after holding meetings with the Syria's new ruling administration.

The number of Syrians wishing to return "had reached almost zero. It's now nearly 30% in the space of a few weeks. There is a message there, which I think is very important, must be listened to and must be acted upon," he said.

Around 200,000 Syrian refugees have already returned since Assad fell, he said, in addition to around 300,000 who fled back to Syria from Lebanon during the Hezbollah-Israel war in September and October, most of whom are thought to have stayed.

Returning the roughly 6 million Syrians who fled abroad and the millions who became internally displaced has been a main aim of Syria's new administration.

But the civil war has left large parts of many major cities in ruins, services decrepit and the vast majority of the population living in poverty. Syria remains under a harsh Western sanctions regime that effectively cuts off its formal economy from the rest of the world.

To aid Syrians returning, many of whom often sell all their belongings to pay for the trip, UN agencies are providing some cash aid for transportation and will help with food and to reconstruct at least parts of broken homes, Grandi said.

More aid is needed from donors, Grandi said, and sanctions should be reconsidered. He did not comment directly on an announcement on Friday by the new US administration of a broad suspension of foreign aid programs.

"If sanctions are lifted, this will improve the conditions in the places where people return," he said.

The US earlier this month provided a six-month sanctions exemption for some sectors, including energy, but Syria's new leaders say much more relief is needed.

Grandi said refugees were responding to a political process that the new administration's leader Ahmed al-Sharaa has committed to, aimed at producing a governing authority by March 1 that better represents Syria's diversity.

"Refugees are listening to what he's saying, to what his people are saying, and that's why I think many people decided to go back," Grandi said. "But many more will come if these things continue to be positive."