Israel admits assassinating Palestinian leader's son in Syria

Israeli military affairs minister Naftali Bennett has admitted that Tel Aviv killed the son of a senior member of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad movement in the Syrian capital last November.

News ID: 449375

Date: 02 March 2020 - 08:34

RNA - On November 11, 2019, the Israeli military launched a strike on the home of Islamic Jihad politburo member Akram Ajouri in Damascus, killing his son Muadh and another person.

The attack coincided with a similar Israeli strike that killed senior Islamic Jihad commander Baha Abu al-Ata in the besieged Gaza Strip, sparking a barrage of retaliatory rocket fire from the besieged enclave into the occupied territories.

In a statement, the Palestinian resistance movement blamed the attacks on “the Zionist criminal enemy”.

In an interview with Israel’s Channel 12 News on Saturday, Bennett said that "upon taking office, we eliminated Baha and indeed attacked Damascus."

Israel has carried out hundreds of airstrikes in Syria, including in the Golan Heights, most of them against what Tel Aviv claims to be the positions of pro-Syrian forces.

Syria has called on the United Nations to adopt necessary measures to stop Israel’s repeated acts of military aggression on the Arab country.

Israel has also been threatening Palestinians in besieged Gaza with a large-scale war, boasting that it would be worse than the previous wars. Palestinian resistance groups have said they are ready to confront any aggression.

Tensions have risen in the occupied Palestine after US unveiled its so-called "deal of the century" which has been unanimously rejected by all Palestinian groups.

Gaza which has witnessed three devastating wars by Israel is under a suffocating blockade that has continued for 13 years. According to a Press TV correspondent, Gazans unanimously stress that resistance is the only mean to end this Israeli blockade.

Israeli settlers uproot Palestinian trees

Attacks by Israeli troops and settlers have risen since Trump unveiled his extremely biased plan for the Palestinian territories.

On Saturday, Israeli settlers attacked Palestinian farms in the occupied West Bank and destroyed hundreds of trees, in the latest litany of such aggressive acts.

They uprooted around 200 grapevines in Faghour area in the town of al-Khader south of Bethlehem, bringing the number of uprooted grapevines and olive trees in the West Bank to 780 in three days, Palestinian reports said.

They also destroyed 300 grapevines in the area of Zakandah, which lies between the settlements of Daniel and Eliazar on Friday.

On Thursday, they chopped 200 olive trees and 80 grapevines in lands near the settlement of Eliazar.

The agriculture industry, olive cultivation in particular, provides livelihood for about 80,000 Palestinian families in the West Bank.

Israeli forces and settlers regularly attack Palestinian villages and farms and set fire to their mosques, olive groves and other properties in the West Bank under the so-called “price tag” policy.

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