RAMALLAH: Four Palestinians were killed Monday during an early-morning Israeli raid in the northern occupied West Bank city of Jenin, the Palestinian health ministry said as violence escalated in the restive area.

According to the official Palestinian agency Wafa, “more than 100 military vehicles and two bulldozers” took part in the raid which took place in the city and its refugee camp – a stronghold of Palestinian armed groups and the target of frequent military incursions.

The four were aged between 23 and 28, and another nine people were wounded, a ministry statement said.

Military drones hovered over the area during the raid, while snipers were positioned on buildings around Jenin’s main hospital, Wafa said.

Part of the hospital’s perimeter wall was also demolished by military bulldozers.

The Israeli military did not immediately comment on the incident.

The deaths come a day after five Palestinians were killed by army fire during several military incursions into the occupied West Bank.

The ministry says nearly 120 Palestinians have been killed in the occupied West Bank since Hamas group stormed across the Gaza border on October 7, killing some 1,400 people, mostly civilians, in the worst-ever attacks in Israel’s history.

Israeli drone strike in West Bank kills three Palestinians, officials say

Israel has hit back with a relentless bombardment which has killed more than 8,000 people, more than half of them children, the health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza says.

The occupied West Bank was already a hotbed of tension before the war with frequent Israeli army raids, a surge in assaults by Jewish settlers, and Palestinian attacks on settlements fanning the unrest.

Israel occupied the West Bank during the 1967 Arab-Israeli war and its forces regularly carry out raids on Palestinian there.