Israel launched a large-scale military operation in the West Bank to combat what the army said was terrorist activity, the latest surge in hostilities in the Palestinian area since the start of the war in Gaza.

Ten Palestinians have been killed and 11 have been injured, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry, which said Israeli soldiers blocked access to hospitals and destroyed infrastructure in towns of Jenin, Tubas and Tulkarem.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said the raids, which began early on Wednesday, were intended to target militants. It said it killed five of them, including one released from prison as part of an exchange for Hamas-held hostages in Gaza in November.

Israeli forces have stepped up operations in the West Bank since Hamas’s Oct 7 assault on southern Israel from the Gaza Strip, a separate Palestinian territory.

An Israeli military spokesman, Nadav Shoshani, said Iran had been smuggling weapons into the West Bank as part of its effort to undermine the Jewish state, and this week’s operation was a pre-emptive strike. His comments on Iran - and similar ones by Foreign Minister Israel Katz on X - could not be corroborated. He added that the blockade of hospitals was to prevent terrorists hiding in them. 

Iran sponsors Hamas and other regional militant groups fighting Israel, including Hezbollah in Lebanon. Both Hamas and Hezbollah are considered terrorist organisations by the US. Earlier on Wednesday, the IDF said it killed a member of the Islamic Jihad group - also linked to Tehran - in the Syria-Lebanon border area.

The IDF’s move in the West Bank “will not bring security and stability to anyone, and everyone will pay the price”, said Nabil Abu Rudineh, a spokesman for the West Bank-based Palestinian presidency.

Hamas said in a statement that “resistance operations in the West Bank are escalating”.

“This situation can only be addressed by open conflict,” the group said on Telegram. It called for mass protests in the area and elsewhere in the Arab world in support of Hamas.

United Nations secretary general António Guterres called for “an immediate cessation” of Israel’s West Bank operations and “strongly condemns the loss of lives, including of children”, according to a statement by his spokesman Stéphane Dujarric on Wednesday evening.

The West Bank has seen a significant rise in violence since the start of the Israel-Hamas conflict, with more IDF operations happening alongside clashes between Palestinians and Jewish settlers.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s far-right coalition government has approved the expansion of settlements in recent months, worsening tensions.

The US State Department announced new sanctions related to West Bank settler violence against Palestinians, targeting an Israeli group, Hashomer Yosh, that it said prevented 250 people expelled from their village from returning. It also sanctioned Yitzhak Levi Filant, who it said led a group of armed settlers that attacked Palestinians on their lands and forcefully removed them.

The Palestinian Health Ministry says more than 650 West Bank Palestinians had been killed since October and 5,400 injured before this week’s operation. Movement restrictions have further exacerbated problems in the territory, limiting access to essential health services.

Shoshani, the IDF spokesperson, said there had been a spike in anti-Israel violence in the northern part of the West Bank with scores of shootings and attacks originating there in the past year. He said the groups involved included Hamas and others funded by Iran.

The economic situation in the West Bank has deteriorated dramatically since October last year. More than 178,000 Palestinian workers have lost their jobs after being banned from entering Israel for security reasons. Many of them worked on Israeli construction sites.

Hamas fighters killed 1,200 people and took another 250 hostage in their Oct 7 attack. Israel’s subsequent offensive has killed more than 40,000 people in Gaza, according to the Hamas-run Health Ministry there.

  - Bloomberg