The Hamas and Palestinian Jihad movements called for adopting armed resistance in the West Bank to confront the Israeli settlement project.
“This option will remain present by our people’s will,” said Hamas in a statement.
The Jihad for its part noted that this option is a normal response to settler crimes.
Both movements' stances were announced after two settlers were injured in an attack near Ramallah. Two Israelis were lightly injured Wednesday during a shooting attack near a Jewish settlement in the central West Bank, the Israeli army said.
The army said the two were on a bus that was fired upon on Route 466 near Beit El, north of Ramallah and were injured by glass after a window shattered due to gunfire. Israeli troops were searching the area for suspects, it added.
The Israeli army closed the roadblocks there, deployed units on the outskirts of the town and began combing to find the gunmen. Recent escalations have raised Israeli fears after a Palestinian attacker killed Israelis in an industrial area in October and carried out stabbing crimes later.
Hamas hailed the shooting attack on the settler bus near Ramallah and Israel’s failure to detain the attacker, Ashraf Naalowa, from last month’s operation.
“Palestinians in all West Bank’s cities are now imposing heroic feuds in the face of the occupation," Hamas said.
It stressed that the confrontations fought by the people in Nablus and the Jenin camp against the occupation forces is a message to the leaders of the enemy and settlers that people support the resistance and its choice to defeat the Israeli occupation.
“Our enemy leaders must understand our people’s message. No security for their project, and that they must leave our beloved land,” Hamas stressed, adding that persistence of settlers to loot their land will only be met by the resistance’s escalation.
Jihad also blessed the escalation in the resistance’s operations in the West Bank, considering it a normal response to the Israeli army and settler crimes.
It considered this escalation a proof of the failure of arrest and prosecution policies adopted by the Israeli authorities against the Palestinian people in the West Bank.
“These operations form a unit in the confrontation against occupation and against terrorism and aggression,” the movement stressed.
