Video is said to show U.N. relief worker taking Israeli shot on Oct. 7

A U.N. relief worker alleged by Israel to have participated in the Oct. 7 attacks was captured on video that day removing the limp body of an Israeli man who had been shot at Kibbutz Beeri and driving off with it, according to information released Friday by Israeli authorities.

Israel told the United Nations Relief and Works Agency last month that Faisal Ali Musalam Naami, 45, and 11 other UNRWA employees participated in or lent support to the Hamas-led assault on southern Israel that precipitated Israel’s war in the besieged Palestinian territory. Israeli authorities have said Hamas and allied gunmen killed 1,200 Israelis and took some 253 people hostage back in Gaza.

The explosive allegations plunged the United Nations into crisis, leading the United States — the agency’s largest donor — and other nations to suspend funding for the relief agency and threatening to collapse its operations in Gaza and the wider Middle East.

The footage of the person Israel identified as Naami would be the first to surface publicly of any of the accused individuals participating in the attack. Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant released a screenshot from the video at a news conference Friday as part of a dossier that publicly identified the accused relief workers. “UNRWA has lost legitimacy and can no longer function as a U.N. body,” Gallant said.

The CCTV footage, located independently by The Washington Post, provides a fuller picture than the brief account in the public dossier, which says Naami “was involved in kidnapping a soldier from Beeri.” Israel has also accused Naami of being part of a Hamas brigade in his hometown of Nuseirat.

After he was named in confidential Israeli documents last month, The Post found images of Naami online and then used facial recognition software to find a likely match for him in footage from Oct. 7. The Post found other indications pointing to Naami as the individual in the footage. A Nissan Terrano II in the footage appears consistent with the same make and model of car that Naami is pictured with in social media posts, including damaged trim on a rear window.

Before Friday’s news conference, a security official told The Post that Israeli authorities had identified the man in the footage as Naami. The footage is among the evidence Israel used as the basis for its allegation against Naami, said the official, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive information.

In the footage from Oct. 7, the SUV drives toward an open gate to Kibbutz Beeri shortly after 9:30 a.m. and stops just inside the entrance, where three men who had been shot and dragged from a car are lying motionless on the ground.

Two men step out of the SUV. The driver, the man identified as Naami, is wearing glasses that match photos from his social media profiles. The other man is carrying a rifle. They open the rear door of the vehicle and spread out a blanket inside.

They approach one of the people who had been shot, a man on the street next to an overturned cooler. It is not clear if he is alive, but he does not react as the man identified as Naami takes him by the jacket, the other man lifts his legs and they carry him to the trunk and place him inside.

They then rummage through belongings that are strewn in the street, taking a cellphone and a hat before driving off less than three minutes after they arrived. It is not clear why or where the two men took the Israeli or why they left the other bodies.

At The Post’s request, two vehicle forensic experts analyzed Naami’s social media photos capturing partial views of a white vehicle. They identified the car as a 1993-1995 Nissan Terrano II, and said the vehicle seen in the Oct. 7 footage matched that same color, make and model and was from the same generation.

Marcus Mazza, a vehicle engineering expert for Robson Forensic, a firm that provides technical expertise in court cases, said the separated trim also “may indicate that these are the same vehicle.”

On Oct. 16, Naami, five of his children and one of his two wives were killed in a strike on their home in Nuseirat, according to an UNRWA colleague who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the news media. His name, the name of a woman who appears to be his wife and the names of his children appear on the Gaza Health Ministry’s list of those killed in Israeli attacks.

The Israel Defense Forces told The Post it “is unaware of a strike at the specified area or time.” A spokesperson, speaking on the condition of anonymity per the agency’s protocol, did not respond when asked if Naami had been targeted.

Efforts to reach surviving members of Naami’s family were unsuccessful. Naami was a social worker at the U.N. agency, according to the colleague and the Israeli dossier.

“His personality was calm, he was very cheerful, he was friendly, he was loved by everyone, colleagues, clients and beneficiaries,” the colleague told The Post.

The colleague said they did not know if Naami was involved in the attack or a member of Hamas. Shown a photo of Naami taken from the Oct. 7 footage, the colleague said they did not know if it was him “as his features are not clear.”

Israeli officials have long complained that the U.N. agency was closely aligned with Hamas, accusations that UNRWA has rejected.

The U.N. agency was established in 1949 to aid Palestinians who were expelled or forced from their homes during the founding of Israel. In the decades since, the agency has taken on many functions of a state for stateless Palestinians, such as providing food, health care and schools. Refugee camps in the occupied Palestinian territories, Lebanon, Jordan and Syria have turned into permanent urban slums.

The allegations that aid workers were members of the organization have threatened the existence of the primary conduit for aid to Gaza’s 2.2 million people whose lives have been upended after nearly four months of war. At least 28,775 people have been killed and 68,552 injured in Gaza since the war began, according to the Gaza Health Ministry.

Since Oct. 7, UNRWA’s schools and medical clinics the agency operates have been closed and turned into shelters that now house more than 1 million people. Palestinians in Gaza are almost totally dependent on UNRWA for the necessities of life as famine looms and diseases spread alongside continuous Israeli ground and air assaults.

On Friday, Gallant said that in addition to the 12 workers, Israel has intelligence indicating that over 30 UNRWA workers participated in the massacre, including the taking of hostages. He said that 12 percent of UNRWA’s 13,000 workers are affiliated with Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad, a smaller Islamist group in the Gaza Strip.

The agency denies that it has turned a blind eye to Hamas and says that Israeli authorities have long sought to dismantle UNRWA.

Last week, the Israeli army uncovered what it said was a subterranean Hamas server complex, dug 65 feet underneath UNRWA headquarters in Gaza. On Tuesday night, the Israeli army released a video of a tunnel beneath Khan Younis, in southern Gaza, that it said was the hideout of Hamas leader Yehiya Sinwar. UNRWA packages were among the underground supplies.

In response to the allegations last month, UNRWA launched a review and, before investigating the allegations, fired 10 of the accused employees; two others were dead. The United States and other countries have indicated they could restore funding after the release of the review.

UNRWA spokeswoman Tamara Alrifai said a man matching Naami’s name joined the agency as social worker in 2006. But she said she could not comment on the ongoing investigation or verify if he was present in the footage shared by The Post.

UNRWA had “not [been] presented with any evidence from the Israeli authorities,” she said, adding. “UNRWA only received from the Israeli government the list of names of alleged staff reportedly involved in the horrible 7/10 attacks.”

Freed hostage Aviva Siegel recounts Hamas’s sexual abuse, violence toward captives

Aviva Siegel, who spent 51 days in Hamas captivity and has since campaigned indefatigably for the remaining hostages, spoke to Channel 12 in an interview broadcast Friday, in which she detailed the Palestinian terror group’s humiliation tactics and sexual violence.

Siegel, 62, who was abducted along with her husband Keith from their home in Kibbutz Kfar Aza by Hamas terrorists on October 7, described the weaponization of sexual violence against female hostages, for whom Siegel has emerged as a fierce advocate since being released during a November truce.

During Hamas’s brutal onslaught, terrorists broke into the Siegels’ Kfar Aza home, snatching the couple to Gaza in their own car. When marching the couple, the terrorists shoved Keith, breaking his ribs.

Siegel said that among the thirteen locations she and her husband were held in was a tunnel so lacking in ventilation that they did not have enough energy to talk. They were left in the tunnels while their Hamas guards would take breaks above ground to breathe fresh air.

After several days, the hostages asked their guards what they should do if they felt suffocation was imminent, and the guards told them to shout for help. Siegel recalled that at one point Keith yelled repeatedly to no avail.

She also described how malnourished the hostages were, sometimes going for days without food or water, while their guards pretended not to understand the hostages’ pleas for sustenance.

Siegel recalled hiding food and when another hostage told her that a piece of bread she had hidden would soon be covered in mold, Siegel replied, “don’t worry, I’ll eat it with the mold.”

Siegel recounted how the terrorists would dress up the younger female hostages in tiny clothes, making them into “dolls — marionettes,” at whom the armed guards “just sat and stared.”

One woman was given such tight-fitting clothes that she couldn’t bend her knee.

Siegel said that when “three particularly young girls” took up the guards’ offer of a shower, the condition was that they would bathe together, with an open door and the terrorists watching.

Siegel said that in another instance, a young female hostage was ordered at gunpoint to accompany a guard, who then pulled her by the hair, tossing her to the floor, as he and three other terrorists beat her with a stick.

“They hit her entire body, and she didn’t say a word,” Siegel said. “When she returned and I asked ‘how did you not scream?’ she said, ‘I didn’t want to give them the satisfaction [of knowing] that they hurt me.'”

Siegel said the guards were not shy about how much they enjoyed tormenting the hostages, frequently pointing guns at them and threatening to shoot before bursting into laughter.

One time, when Keith spoke despite a guard demanding silence, a terrorist threatened him with a gun and dangled handcuffs in his face, “kind of in jest, but irritated,” Siegel said. “After that, Keith entered a dayslong depression. He barely communicated; we would cry covertly.”

After 50 days, Hamas terrorists covered the Siegel couple’s eyes and took them to a new location, where they separated Keith from Aviva, who, unbeknownst to her, was slated to be released the following day.

“[The Hamas guard] comes to my room, kneels, and says, ‘you, tomorrow, Israel,’ and I say, ‘no, no, no, no, no, Keith and me.’ He says to me, ‘you leave now. Israel, your name. Keith, tomorrow.” Siegel asked to see Keith, but the terrorist refused, at which point she pushed him aside and approached her husband.

Choking back tears, Siegel recalled her last moments with Keith, who has still not been released.

“I looked at him and told him that I need to go, and I hugged him, and that is how I left him,” she said.

Due to the lack of oxygen, Siegel’s guards were afraid she would be unable to climb the stairs out of the tunnel where she was held, 40 meters underground.

“I ran,” she recalled.

On the ride home, Siegel noticed an elderly female hostage, Elma Avraham, who was in critical condition. Siegel massaged her continuously to keep her warm.

“It’s possible that if you weren’t there this would not happen,” Avraham’s son Uri Ravitz later told Siegel at the hospital, referring to his mother’s recuperation. “So I feel like I also owe her life to you.”

Siegel’s daughter Ilan told Channel 12 that when her mother was first released, the family was certain that their father would soon follow.

Aviva said that at first, she saved stories from the captivity for her husband to tell, assuming his release was just around the corner.

Upon her release, Siegel was relieved most of all to learn that her son Shai, who also lives in Kfar Aza, had survived the October 7 massacre. For her entire captivity, she had thought he was dead because he was not in the tunnel with her and the other Kfar Aza hostages.

Recalling her grandmother’s silence about her experiences during the Holocaust, Siegel said that she had resolved not to be quiet about her ordeal. “People need to know,” she said.

Asked if she considers herself a Holocaust survivor, Siegel replied, “I have definitely survived.”

“The world really let me feel it stays silent, and I have a feeling that they have missed the history lesson of the Holocaust, in allowing something like this to happen,” she said.

The interview was Siegel’s first on Israeli television since being freed. As a hostage, Siegel refused to hear about the October 7 atrocities, and in the immediate aftermath of her release, she remained silent about her ordeal, but she has since become vocal on behalf of the remaining hostages at public rallies, parliamentary hearings and other forums, speaking at length about the Hamas captors’ sexual violence.

In a January 9 Knesset hearing, Siegel described how at one point in their captivity, a younger female hostage returned from using the bathroom and looked distraught. But when she attempted to give the girl a hug, a terrorist guarding them intercepted her and prevented the embrace.

“I saw that she was withdrawn, quiet and not herself,” Siegel said. “And excuse my language, but this son of a bitch had touched her. And he didn’t even let me hug her after it happened. It’s terrible, simply terrible. I told her I was sorry.”

On January 23, Siegel returned to the Knesset to address the newly established caucus on victims of sexual and gender violence in the war against Hamas.

Aviva and Keith Siegel lived in Kfar Aza for four decades. Aviva, also known as Adrienne, was born in South Africa, and came to Israel at age 8. Keith is from the United States. They met in Kibbutz Gezer, where Keith, who works in pharmaceuticals, had come to volunteer, and Aviva, now a kindergarten teacher, was spending a year of pre-army community service. They have four children and five grandchildren.

On October 7, thousands of gunmen led by the Palestinian terror group stormed Kfar Aza and other communities in southern Israel to kill nearly 1,200 people, mainly civilians, and take 253 hostages of all ages, while committing numerous atrocities and weaponizing sexual violence on a mass scale. Some 80 members of Kibbutz Kfar Aza were killed, and about 18 were taken hostage.

Hamas’s shock assault triggered a war in Gaza that has seen some 50 percent of the Strip’s residences destroyed and led to the displacement of over a million people, many of whom face severe risk of starvation. According to the Gaza Strip’s Hamas-controlled health ministry, over 28,000 Palestinians have been killed in the hostilities. The figure, which cannot be independently verified, does not distinguish between civilians and combatants, of whom the Israeli military claims to have killed upward of 10,000.

Palestinian Authority’s Financial Plight Threatens U.S. Plans for Postwar Gaza

WASHINGTON—The Biden administration is looking to financially prop up the Palestinian Authority amid warnings from officials in Ramallah that it is close to running out of money, potentially jeopardizing U.S. hopes that the organization will be able to govern Gaza when Israel’s war with Hamas is over.

The administration is trying to work around a law that prevents it from contributing directly to the Palestinian Authority, while also nudging allies to give more to the organization, U.S. officials said. Palestinian officials have warned that they could run out of the money needed to pay salaries and provide essential government services as soon as late February, the U.S. officials said.

Early in the war in Gaza, the U.S. opted to rely on a revitalized Palestinian Authority as the best, if not only, option for what it has described as “the day after” the war ends. U.S. officials said they are concerned that without a revenue boost, the organization won’t be stable enough to maintain its hold on power in the West Bank, let alone be in a position to take on an expanded role.

The organization’s financial plight also limits its ability to implement overhauls the U.S. says are needed to secure support from Israel and from the Palestinian public. The Palestinian Authority has been dogged by accusations of corruption and ties to extremists that led to the cutoff of U.S. funds in the first place.

Several proposals have been made to resolve the Israel-Hamas conflict, but disagreements over Gaza’s governance are blocking progress.

The Palestinian Authority has relied over the years on assistance from the U.S. and Europe and tax revenue collected by Israel. Cuts in aid by the Trump administration put the Ramallah-based organization under financial strain, and a suspension of Israeli tax revenue after the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks on Israel has left the Ramallah-based government “on the verge of financial collapse,” a senior Palestinian official told The Wall Street Journal.

In October, Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich initially suspended the delivery of all tax revenue, which had been transferred monthly to the Palestinian Authority pending the ministry’s approval. The Israeli government then opted to suspend only revenue earmarked for the Palestinian Authority’s employees in Gaza, saying the funds go into the pockets of Hamas militants.

In response, the Palestinian Authority said it wouldn’t accept any partial revenue transfers. The organization pays the salaries of about 150,000 public-sector employees in the West Bank and Gaza, according to its official estimates.

In December, President Biden asked Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to accept a proposal to transfer the frozen tax revenues to Norway for safekeeping until an arrangement could be found that would assuage Israel’s concerns that the money would fund Hamas, according to U.S. officials. Israel’s government said in January that it agreed to the plan, but U.S., European and Palestinian officials said a few sticking points remained.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken has said that the revenue should be conveyed to the Palestinian Authority in accordance with previous agreements, according to a statement about his meetings with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas in January.

The Biden administration is struggling to overcome concerns about the Palestinian Authority’s aging leadership and unpopularity, particularly in Gaza, where it was ousted from power by Hamas in 2007.

If the organization runs out of money, U.S. officials say, it will be vulnerable to groups viewed by the U.S. and Israel as more extremist and opposed to compromise. It could also be overwhelmed by a deteriorating security situation in the West Bank, the officials say, amid an increase in clashes between Israeli forces and Palestinian militants, as well as attacks by Israeli extremists.

The Palestinian Authority has been in financial crisis since 2020, the senior Palestinian official said. The Palestinian finance ministry is operating under the “most restrictive budget, which is the worst-case scenario, paying a portion of public servants and trying to pay portions of previous debt,” he said. He added that he hoped international pressure would bring a speedy transfer of the funds.

The U.S. is limited in its ability to provide direct support. In March 2018, Congress enacted the Taylor Force Act, suspending U.S. bilateral economic assistance for the Palestinian Authority because of its practice of providing payments to Palestinians accused of terrorism and their relatives.

In 2018, former President Donald Trump directed the State Department to withdraw $200 million in aid that was originally planned for programs in the West Bank and Gaza, following a review of U.S. assistance to the Palestinian Authority. Biden reversed the move shortly after taking office, restoring much of the aid, which isn’t subject to the Taylor Force Act’s ban on direct assistance.

In January, as Congress grappled over a foreign-aid package that was passed by the Senate on Tuesday, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell called the Palestinian Authority “relentlessly and thoroughly corrupt” and objected to including funding for Palestinian aid.

Some U.S. lawmakers described the United Nations and other international organizations as potential ways to circumvent Taylor Force Act restrictions. The bill approved by the Senate, which would provide $14.1 billion for Israel’s war against Hamas, includes almost $10 billion for humanitarian aid for civilians in conflict zones, including Palestinians in Gaza, which wouldn’t go directly to the Palestinian Authority. The bill still faces a significant hurdle in the House.

A boost by the U.S.’s European Union allies in financial support for the Palestinian Authority appears unlikely. “The EU is already doing an awful lot, but I don’t see that we are about to increase our support financially,” EU Special Representative for the Middle East Peace Process Sven Koopmans said in an interview.

While the Palestinian Authority is often subject to criticism over issues including corruption, it is “an essential partner and we have to stand by them and we also encourage them very much to reform and we are helping them on that,” Koopmans said. “If the PA collapses for any reason, it is a catastrophe for the security situation, for the Palestinians, for the Israelis and for the wider region.”

Gallant: Hamas seeking to replace Sinwar, Khan Younis Brigade is defeated
Hamas’s leadership abroad is looking to replace its Gaza leader Yahya Sinwar, as the terror group’s battalions in Khan Younis have been dismantled and an offensive in Rafah looms, Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said Sunday.

Security forces have yet to get their hands on Sinwar, or Hamas’s military commander Mohammad Deif and his deputy Marwan Issa. But Sinwar has reportedly been out of contact with the terror group’s leadership abroad since the end of January and his involvement in ongoing hostage negotiations is in question.

“Hamas does not trust its commanders — this is a very, very noticeable thing,” Gallant said following an assessment with the head of the Israel Defense Forces’ Southern Command, Maj. Gen. Yaron Finkelman.

“Hamas-Gaza is MIA, there is no one to talk to among leadership on the ground,” he said, alleging that Hamas leadership abroad was looking for new leaders in Gaza. “That means there is a tender [in Hamas] for who will run Gaza,” he said.

In Khan Younis, Gallant said some 200 terror suspects had surrendered to troops at Nasser Hospital, and dozens more at Al-Amal Hospital, which he argued indicated the loss of Hamas’s “fighting spirit.”

“People armed with RPGs, weapons, and guns came to the moment of truth and did not fight. This indicates something of their understanding of the power differential, that they understood their fate was to surrender or die — there is no third option,” he said.

Gallant said Hamas’s Khan Younis Brigade had been “defeated and does not function as a military entity in any way.”

“Hamas is left with marginal [forces] in the central camps and with the Rafah Brigade, and what stands between them and a complete collapse as a military system is a decision by the IDF,” he said.

“There is no one here to come to their aid, no Iranians, no international aid,” Gallant said, vowing that the army would dismantle the remaining six Hamas battalions — two in central Gaza and four in Rafah.

“We have no right to stop as long as there are 134 hostages” held by Hamas, he added.

Also Sunday, the IDF said special forces operating at Nasser Hospital had located vehicles used by Hamas terrorists who participated in the October 7 onslaught, as well as Israeli-owned cars stolen during the massacre.

The operation at Nasser Hospital, which began Thursday, is being carried out by the Commando Brigade, Navy’s Shayetet 13, Shin Bet agents, and other special forces.

One of the stolen cars found at the medical center belonged to a Nir Oz resident, according to the IDF. In a Hamas vehicle, troops found several weapons, including grenades.

The IDF said some of the terror operatives detained at the hospital were dressed up as hospital staff. Other suspects who were holed up at the hospital included many who participated in the October 7 massacre and have links to the hostages held by the terror group, it said.

Troops also seized several firearms, explosive devices, and other military equipment belonging to terror operatives, the IDF said.

Also at Nasser Hospital, IDF troops found closed boxes of medications bearing the names of hostages.

The medications, which were reportedly delivered to Gaza in a secretive initiative coordinated by the families of some of the hostages, apparently did not reach their destinations.

The IDF released footage showing the medication with the names of the hostages, some of whom are still being held captive by Hamas.

The IDF asserted that its searches of the Nasser Hospital premises ensured that the medical center was able to continue its operations “without harming the patients and medical staff, and in accordance with the values ​​of the IDF and international law.”

This contrasted with a statement by the head of the World Health Organization, who said Sunday that Nasser Hospital “is not functional anymore,” during the raid.

Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said a WHO team was not allowed to enter on Friday or Saturday to assess patients and medical needs. In a post on X, he said about 200 patients remain there, including 20 who need urgent referrals elsewhere.

It is not clear where the WHO tally is from, since its teams did not enter the hospital. Hamas said Saturday that 120 patients remain at the hospital.

Gaza health ministry spokesperson Ashraf al-Qidra told Reuters that water supply to the hospital had halted because generators had been out of action for three days, sewage was flooding emergency rooms, and the remaining staff had no way of treating intensive care patients.

A lack of oxygen supplies — also a result of having no power — had caused the deaths of at least seven patients, he asserted.

While Gazans sheltering at the facility were told to evacuate ahead of the incursion, the IDF claims it has taken pains to keep the hospital functioning for patients, including transferring fuel and medical supplies to the facility.

Elsewhere in Khan Younis, the IDF said troops of the 98th Division raided several Hamas positions, killing gunmen and locating weapons in the process, the IDF said.

The division’s 7th Armored Brigade killed some 20 Hamas operatives with tank shelling and directed airstrikes on additional gunmen in western Khan Younis, according to the IDF.

Another 15 Hamas operatives were killed and a weapons depot was destroyed in a series of airstrikes in the city, the IDF said.

In central Gaza, the IDF said the Nahal Brigade killed at least 10 Hamas operatives during the past day, including by calling in airstrikes.

According to local residents and Hamas media officials, Israeli planes carried out attacks on two areas in Rafah Sunday, including an empty building near the border with Egypt.

Strikes and fighting killed at least 10 people in Rafah and central Gaza’s Deir al-Balah overnight, said the official Palestinian news agency Wafa.

At the morgue of a Rafah hospital, mourners bent down to give a final kiss to a loved one wrapped in a white body bag.

“That’s my cousin — he was martyred in Al-Mawasi, in the ‘safe area,'” said Ahmad Mohammed Aburizq.

“And my mother was martyred the day before. There’s no safe place. Even the hospital is not safe.”

In the central Gaza town of Zawaida, people dug through rubble from a Saturday airstrike to search for bodies, including those of children. “Our message is to the Israeli government and the Hamas government present in Gaza: Please stop the war. Enough war,” said Samah al-Karnz, who lived near the building hit in the strike.

The war broke out on October 7, when Hamas carried out a devastating attack on southern Israel, killing some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and taking 253 hostages.

Palestinians inspect the destruction in Rafah following an Israeli airstrike on February 18, 2024. (MOHAMMED ABED / AFP)
In response, Israel launched a war with the aim of securing the release of the hostages and toppling Hamas from power in Gaza. The Hamas-run Gaza health ministry said Sunday that 28,985 people had been killed in the enclave since the start of the war.

These figures cannot be independently verified and do not distinguish between Hamas members and civilians. They also include Palestinians killed as a consequence of terror groups’ own rocket misfires. The IDF says it has killed nearly 11,000 Hamas operatives in Gaza, in addition to some 1,000 terrorists inside Israel on October 7.

The war has caused a humanitarian crisis in the Gaza Strip, with most of the population displaced and at risk of starvation.

Over half of the Strip’s 2.3 million Palestinians have sought refuge in the southernmost city of Rafah — the last city in the enclave where the IDF ground forces seek to operate.

In response to international concern about what would happen to the people in Rafah, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said residents will be evacuated before a ground offensive begins there, though it is unclear where they will be able to go.

Reuters reported on February 18 that Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) Quds Force commander Esmail Ghaani directed Iranian-backed Iraqi groups to “pause” attacks on US forces during a January 29 meeting in Baghdad.[1] Ghaani met with the leaders of Iranian-backed Iraqi militia groups less than 48 hours after the Iranian-backed drone attack on January 28 that killed three US servicemembers in Jordan. Kataib Hezbollah responded to Iranian directives from Ghaani by announcing that it would “suspend attacks” on January 30.[2] Harakat Hezbollah al Nujaba did not “initially agree” to Ghaani’s directive.[3] The group said that it would continue attacks targeting US forces on February 2, after Ghaani’s visit.[4] The Islamic Resistance in Iraq claimed three attacks targeting US forces after Ghaani’s visit.[5] It has not claimed any attacks after February 4.[6]

Ghaani’s visit illustrates the degree to which Iran controls its proxy network across the Middle East. Most of Iran’s proxies and partners in Iraq immediately ceased attacks following Ghaani’s order. Harakat Hezbollah al Nujaba initially did not agree but Iranian-backed Iraqi groups have not resumed attacks targeting US forces since February 4.[7] Ghaani and Iran can pressure their partners and proxies to pause or resume attacks as needed, however. Nine Iranian and Iraqi sources told Reuters that Ghaani chose to pause attacks to “avoid a similar escalation” to the 2020 escalation cycle that resulted in the US airstrike that killed former IRGC Quds Force commander Qassem Soleimani. Ghaani could resume attacks in pursuit of Iranian objectives—namely, expelling US forces from Iraq—as needed when or if Iran calculates that the risk of “similar escalation” decreases

U.S. Strike Killed Afghans Recruited to Fight for Iran
Refugees who joined the largely overlooked Fatemiyoun Brigade to battle for Shiite Islam and escape crushing poverty had become a force in Tehran’s proxy wars.

It was a memorial for the “martyrs” killed when the U.S. struck military bases in Syria, according to Iranian state television.

A small crowd sat in rows of folding chairs, men in the front and women in the back, at the main cemetery in Tehran, the Iranian capital, earlier this month. Children milled around and a young man passed a box of sweets. A man recited prayers through a microphone.

But the 12 fallen men weren’t Iranians. They were Afghans, according to other soldiers and local media reports, part of the Fatemiyoun Brigade, a largely overlooked force that dates to the height of the Syrian civil war a decade ago. To help President Bashar al-Assad of Syria beat back rebel forces and Islamic State terrorists, Iran at the time began recruiting thousands of Afghan refugees to fight, offering $500 a month, schooling for their children, and Iranian residency.

The brigade is still believed to be about 20,000 strong, drawn from Afghan refugees living mostly in Iran, and it serves under the command of the Quds Force, the overseas arm of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards.

Iranian media affiliated with the Guards and social media platforms dedicated to the Fatemiyoun published the names and photographs of the slain Afghans and said they were killed in U.S. strikes in Iraq and Syria. The U.S. strikes were conducted in retaliation for a January drone attack on a military base in Jordan that killed three American soldiers. The U.S. had blamed an Iran-backed militia based in Iraq for the attack.

Publicly, Iranian officials denied that any military personnel linked to Iran were among the casualties. Iran’s ambassador to the United Nations, Amir Saeid Iravani, told the U.N. Security Council days after the U.S. strikes that Iran had no connection to the bases attacked in Iraq and Syria. He accused the U.S. of falsely blaming Iran and said only civilians had been killed.

The Guards did not issue a statement acknowledging the deaths of the Afghans under their command as they typically do when Iranian forces are killed, nor did any official threaten to avenge the deaths.

After the Taliban regained control of Afghanistan, many refugees undertook the arduous journey by foot over the mountains and across the border into Iran.

The story of the Afghan casualties, however, emerged from at least four cities across Iran — Tehran, Shiraz, Qum and Mashhad — where the bodies of the Afghans were quietly repatriated to their families, according to photos and videos on Iranian media.

At the funeral processions, the coffins of the Afghans were draped in green cloth but bore the flag of no nation. In the cities of Mashhad, Qum and Shiraz, they were carried to religious shrines for blessings.

Some mourners carried the yellow flag of the Fatemiyoun Brigade with its emblem. Local officials, clerics and a representative from the Revolutionary Guards and members of the Afghan refugee community attended some of the funerals, according to photos and videos. Two little girls wearing matching pink jackets, their hair in ponytails, wailed at their father’s coffin at another funeral on the outskirts of Tehran.

“There is growing anxiety among Afghans that they are getting killed and Iran is not protecting them and disowning their martyrs to protect its own interests,” said Hossein Ehsani, an expert on militants and terrorism movements in the Middle East who is Afghan and grew up as a refugee in Iran. “They feel they are used as cannon fodder.”

Iran’s mission to the U.N. did not respond to a question about whether Mr. Iravani, the U.N. ambassador, was aware of the Fatemiyoun casualties when he spoke to the Security Council.

Afghans, including fighters for the Quds Force, expressed anger and frustration at Iran’s handling of these deaths, posting near-daily messages on a social media channel dedicated to Fatemiyoun voices. Some members questioned the silence of the Quds Force, calling it discrimination.

Among the men killed were two senior commanders who were close allies of the slain former Quds Force commander, Maj. Gen. Qassim Suleimani, according to Iranian media reports and photographs of them together in the Syrian battlefield. They were identified as Seyed Ali Hosseini and Seyed Hamzeh Alavi.

Mr. Suleimani was assassinated by the U.S. in 2020 in Iraq.

Most of the Afghans who fled to Iran over the years were Hazaras, one of the largest ethnic groups in their country who share the Shiite Muslim faith with most Iranians.

At home in Afghanistan, the Hazaras were among the natural allies of American forces because they shared common enemies in the Taliban and in Al Qaeda. But in the convoluted landscape of the Middle East today, they are now aligned with Iran and seeking to chase American forces out of the region.

In Syria, the Fatemiyoun force was often the first line of defense in the battle against ISIS and was widely credited for helping take back several Syrian cities. The government newspaper Iran said last week that at least 3,000 members of the force were killed in Syria over the years. The United States designated the Fatemiyoun as a terrorist organization in 2019.

A former member of the Fatemiyoun Brigade, an Afghan who was born and raised in Iran and was deployed to Syria three times, said he was drawn to the force because it provided an opportunity to escape crushing poverty and unemployment in Iran and gain legal status.

Asking that his that his name not be published for fear of retribution, he said many fighters also joined out of a desire to protect Shiite Islam and defeat a Sunni extremist force similar to the ones that had persecuted Hazaras in Afghanistan.

Another Afghan refugee, Mohamad, a 31-year-old Hazara Shiite and a former military officer in Afghanistan who fled to Iran when the Taliban retook the country, said in a telephone interview that he had a master’s degree but works in construction. Afghans also must worry about a growing crackdowns on undocumented migrants and threats of deportation, he said.

“One of my Afghan friends who is from my hometown told me he wants to join the Fatemiyoun out of pure financial desperation and fear of being sent back to Afghanistan,” said Mohamad, who asked that his last name not be used for fear of retaliation. “We are stuck, with no way forward and no way back.”

Analysts say that there is no evidence that Fatemiyoun forces were directly involved in attacks against American bases in Iraq and Syria, which the Pentagon says have been targeted more than 160 times by Iran-backed proxies since the start of the Israel-Hamas war in October. But the Fatemiyoun Brigade plays a significant role in helping Iran coordinate logistics on the ground for the network of militias it supports, funds and arms across the region.

The Fatemiyoun forces oversee bases that serve as key stops along the supply chain of weapons, including drones, missile parts and technology, that makes its way from Iran to Iraq and then Syria and to Hezbollah in Lebanon, according to analysts and a military strategist affiliated with the Guards, who asked not to be identified because he was not authorized to speak publicly.

“When the wider Syrian conflict froze several years ago, there was an expectation that Fatemiyoun would go home, disband and demobilize,” said Charles Lister the director of the Syria and Countering Terrorism and Extremism programs at the Middle East Institute in Washington. “But they have kind of melted into the wider regional network and have found a role to play — holding ground, coordinating logistics and wider coordination on the ground.”

American fighter jets destroyed the base where the Fatemiyoun were killed in Deir al-Zour, in eastern Syria, leaving a pile of rubble, mangled bricks and debris, according to a photograph published on the website Saberin News, affiliated with Iran’s proxy militias.

Maj. Gen. Patrick Ryder, a Pentagon spokesman, declined to comment specifically about the U.S. strikes killing Afghan fighters for Iran. But he said the strikes were conducted to hold the Guard and their proxies accountable and that “initial indications are that over 40 militants associated with Iranian proxy groups were killed or injured.”

Iranian commanders and key personnel were evacuated from the bases in anticipation of the American strikes as the Biden administration signaled for nearly a week that attacks were pending. But Afghans remained at the base, one Iranian official affiliated with the Guards said, adding that military bases couldn’t be abandoned.

At the funeral for five of the Afghans, including the two senior commanders, Hojatolislam Alireza Panahian, a prominent conservative cleric, told the mourners that the enemy was “dumb” to kill vulnerable Afghans.

“They are martyrs without borders, and jihadists for Islam and the resistance front.”

AFGHANS AND PAKISTANIS The Qods Force also recruited Afghans and Pakistanis for the Syrian war. There was precedent for this dating back to the 1980s, when the IRGC created an Afghan militia called Sepah-e Mohammed, which occasionally fought the Soviets, the Afghan communists, and the Taliban.

To cite another example: during the “Holy Defense” against Saddam Hussein in the 1980s, the IRGC trained and equipped an all-Afghan fighting force, the Abuzar Brigade.30 Many veterans of the Sepah-e Mohammed and Abuzar were still around decades later when Qassem Soleimani created an all-Afghan unit to fight in Syria. T

An example is Ali Reza Tavassoli, an Afghan Shia who fought against Iraq in the 1980s, attended seminary in Qom, and was living in Mashhad when the Qods Force recruited him to form the Fatemiyoun Battalion for the Syrian fight.

When Tavassoli was killed in 2016, other Afghan veterans of the Abuzar took his place. By the end of that year the Fatemiyoun Division had an estimated 12,000 fighters in its ranks, making it one of the largest foreign units fighting on the Syrian government’s behalf.

The IRGC’s primary recruiting pool for Afghan fighters was the refugee population in Iran, which the United Nations high commissioner for refugees estimated at nearly 3 million. Of this number only a third were documented as refugees, while another half a million had temporary documents and limited-residency permits.

That left nearly 1.5 million without any papers at all and therefore vulnerable to periodic deportation sweeps. It was this latter group that provided the largest number of recruits for the Fatemiyoun. The Qods Force offered numerous inducements to convince undocumented Afghan refugees to fight in Syria. The financial ones were impressive enough—five hundred to a thousand dollars per fighter per month, a large sum considering that Afghans earned around two hundred dollars a month laying bricks in Isfahan or twenty-five back home in Bamiyan.

In addition to the money, some recruits were offered ten-year residency permits that also included their families, school registration for their children, and the lure of eventual Iranian citizenship.  Also, Afghans facing criminal charges could avoid fines and imprisonment by fighting the Islamic State.

However, there were sticks too, for Afghans who resisted Iranian blandishments. For example, Qods Force recruiters threatened deportation for the undocumented. The IRGC also played on the fears of Afghan Shia regarding their future in Afghanistan. According to one Fatemiyoun recruit, “The Guards commanders were saying that, if it comes to it, we will make Bamian [sic] into a base for you, a base for Fatemiyoun.”

Afghan recruits normally received (notwithstanding the Guardian’s interviewee) thirty days of training in Iran, in the Mashhad area or Varamin, prior to deployment. When they reached Syria they were often used as shock troops, spearheading Qods Force assaults to recapture valuable targets like Aleppo, Palmyra, and Daraa.

Indeed, the Fatemiyoun casualty numbers were high, if we credit the Iranian media. Before his death in Baghdad in 2020, Qassem Soleimani tried to use the example of Afghan martyrs in Syria to change the negative perceptions that many Iranians had of Afghan refugees: “Thank God, Afghan people are now viewed differently and are well respected. People visit and honor the graves of Afghan martyrs as they visit and honor holy shrines. … Nothing could have impressed part of the Iranian society in its dealings with Afghan families as much as [Afghan fighters’] martyrdom and their selfless defense of ideals did. There is now a great respect for [Afghans] in Iran.”When the Fatemiyoun Battalion was first created, IRGC recruiters also brought in Shia fighters from Pakistan to fight under its aegis. Most of these were recruited from Parachinar, a predominantly Shia Pashtun district on the border between Afghanistan and Pakistan’s Khyber wa Pakhtunwa Province.

Later, the Pakistani Shia were numerous enough to create their own Zeinabiyoun Brigade under IRGC management and control.Here was yet another element of Qassem Soleimani’s international division of foreign, mostly Shia, combatants fighting to keep Bashar al-Asad in power. Iran’s cynical use of Afghan refugees to prosecute a foreign war may yet ultimately boomerang against it.

Unrest among Afghan refugees is a nearly constant concern as it is for security forces in eastern Iran, but the situation could become explosive as the body bags of “martyred” Afghans continue to flow out of Syria or if the Iranian government fails to honor its pledges of citizenship and residency.

Iran avoids paying price for proxy wars as it garners several strategic gains

Since February 4, there have been no reports of American targets hit by pro-Iranian militias, in contrast to around 20 weekly attacks in the preceding period, as well as 160 attacks in Iraq and Syria since October 7.

Last week, the Abu Dhabi-registered Aram website reported that behind the halt in attacks, according to Iranian sources, was a visit to Iraq by Esmail Qaani, the commander of the Revolutionary Guards' Quds Force, shortly after the attack on an American base on the Jordanian border at the end of January, in which three American soldiers were killed.

According to this report, Qaani met with the heads of pro-Iranian militias in Baghdad and demanded that they stop their attacks. Most of them agreed to obey, aside from one, the al-Nujaba militia, which ultimately joined the others. Halting these attacks did not prevent an American retaliation, but this appeared to be less extensive and intense than what might have been expected, based on hints issued by the administration as to its intentions.

The proximity of Qaani's visit and the cessation of attacks on American targets should not be surprising. Iran keeps repeating that each one of its partners in the "axis of resistance," including Hezbollah in Lebanon, the Houthis in Yemen and the pro-Iranian militias in Iraq, operate independently, "based on conditions and circumstances that suit them in any one of the arenas." However, Qaani's appearance in Baghdad proved overtly, if proof was needed, the direct link between Tehran and the region's "axis of resistance" militias. This link has its own limitations, which illustrate the limits of Iran's influence.

One could, for example, question the need for sending Qaani, who doesn't speak Arabic, to hold a meeting with militia leaders, rather than giving instructions over the phone. There were two reasons for this.

The Iraqi government has in recent weeks been holding an intensive dialogue with the U.S. army regarding the withdrawal of American forces, numbering 2,500 soldiers, from Iraq. Iran was concerned that continued clashes between the American army and these militias would delay this withdrawal and even provide the Americans a pretext for prolonging their stay in Iraqi territory. Qaani had to coordinate with Iraq's prime minister the timetable for the American withdrawal and ensure that Iraq does not renege on its decision.

The other reason relates to the need to resolve the relations between the militias and the Iraqi government. The militias in Iraq are diverse, and each one of them has, in addition to its partnership in the "axis of resistance," its own agenda that depends not just on Iran but on its factional bosses within Iraq and on the conduct of Iraq's government under Mohammed Shia al-Sudani.

Prime Minister of Iraq Mohammed Shia Al-Sudani in negotiations on the U.S. withdrawal from the country, in January.
Open gallery view Prime Minister of Iraq Mohammed Shia Al-Sudani in negotiations on the U.S. withdrawal from the country, in January.Credit: AFP
Thus, for example, in June 2020, six months after the assassination of Qasem Soleimani, Qaani's predecessor, Qaani for the first time had to obtain an entry visa into Iraq in order to be able to hold a working meeting in that country. The prime minister at that time was Mustafa al-Kadhimi, who had decided to reduce the operations and influence of pro-Iranian militias, taking precedent-setting action against them by instructing the anti-terror unit of Iraq's army to raid a base of the Iraqi Hezbollah brigades militia, a base which held weapons, explosives and missiles that were meant to be launched against American targets.

Qaani was also not carrying welcome news to militia commanders. He informed them that Iran intended to slash their budgets and that they would have to rely on funds they received from Iraq's defense ministry, then estimated at amounting to $2 billion a year for all the militias.

The militias in Iraq have turned not only into a military force attacking American bases; they are threatening the government's ability to govern the county in the same manner Hezbollah operates in Lebanon. The militias have turned into an economic powerhouse that has taken over government projects, with militia commanders operating private border crossings, mainly on the border with Iran. They threaten foreign investors and manage private banks, thereby blocking the efforts of Iraq's prime minister to recruit foreign investors, mainly from the West.

Iran may control their operations against American targets, but with regard to their operations within Iraq and in facing Iraq's government, Iran's standing is complex and limited, to the point at which it often seems that in the balance between Iran's interests and those of local bosses, most militias prefer to operate according to instructions from local politicians, rather than on Iranian ones, until it comes to Iran's security and foreign relations.

The remote activation of militias and local forces, as part of the "axis of resistance," puts some limitations on Iran in the Yemeni, Syrian and Lebanese arenas as well. Two days ago, it was reported that the Houthis had hit a British vessel and intercepted an American drone. American forces reported for the first time that they had hit an underwater drone operated by the Houthis. The U.S. and Britain are attacking targets in Yemen on a daily basis, but it seems that these attacks have not yet attained the deterrence required to halt the clashes in the Red Sea, whose economic costs are mounting daily.

Houthi followers show support for residents of the Gaza Strip in a demonstration in Yemen's capital, Sana'a, in January.
Open gallery view Houthi followers show support for residents of the Gaza Strip in a demonstration in Yemen's capital, Sana'a, in January.Credit: Osamah Abdulrahman/AP
Iran is the one equipping the Houthis with advanced weapons, as well as with the knowhow and technology enabling them to build their own missiles and drones. However, the extent to which Iran can determine Houthi operations and targets is unclear. The Houthis have their own agenda, which is not necessarily dependent on Iran's.

President Biden decided to include them again in the list of terror organizations, in a more limited manner than the status they held when Trump was president, but in a way that allows the imposition of international sanctions. In tandem, the Houthis are continuing their negotiations with the Saudis over ending the war in Yemen. It appears that they intend to exploit the confrontation with coalition forces in the Red Sea in order to extort concessions for their own benefit, unrelated to Iran's position. There is thus no certainty that if a cease-fire is reached in Gaza, the Houthis would join it in their "private" arena, even if Iran demands that they stop their attacks.

Iran has also understood that Syria cannot take part in the group of "united fronts" against Israel. Not only are its emissaries in Syria, including senior commanders in the Revolutionary Guards, at risk of being assassinated, President Assad has made clear to Iran the boundaries of pro-Iranian militia operations against Israel. Thus, for example, in 2021 Iran was obliged, under instructions of Bashar al-Assad, to return General Ahmad Madani, also known as Haj Javad Ghaffari, to Iran, after serving as the Quds Force commander in Syria.

One of the main reasons for his forced return to Iran was the instigation of attacks on Israel and on American targets from Syrian territory, in a way that could have led to a war against Syria. He was replaced by General Razi Mousavi, who was assassinated last December in an attack attributed to Israel.

Syria's President Bashar al-Assad with Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian in Damascus, Syria, last week.
Open gallery view Syria's President Bashar al-Assad with Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian in Damascus, Syria, last week.Credit: Syrian Presidency's Telegram channel via AFP
It's not only Israel that is operating against Iranian forces in Syria. Russia also limits their operations as part of its understandings with Israel, according to which Israel continues to enjoy freedom of the skies against Iranian targets that are assisting Hezbollah, as long as it doesn't hit Syrian government targets.

Iran itself has not yet paid a price for operating militias and organizations acting in its name in the region. Along with its dissociation from any links to these militias, it presents itself as the only country that holds the lever over several violent arenas in the region, even when its control over such organizations is not complete and absolute and is dependent on local factors and considerations which are not always subservient to its guidance.

Thus, due to the war in Gaza, it has attained a unique strategic standing which is being bolstered by its renewed diplomatic relations with Saudi Arabia, and by the indirect dialogue it is holding with Washington, which is trying to set boundaries to the arena.

N]ew footage purportedly shows Gazan civilians protesting against Hamas

An anti-Hamas Telegram channel shared a series of videos on Tuesday night purportedly documenting protests against the terror group in the Strip.

In the short clips published on the “Gaza’s Liberators” channel, people are seen chanting slogans against Hamas leaders: “Bring down Hamas,” “The people want a bag of flour, and “Sinwar, Haniyeh, the people are the victims,” referencing Hamas’s Gaza leader Yahya Sinwar and politburo chief Ismail Haniyeh.

They were reportedly filmed in Rafah, the southern town where over a million displaced Gazans are sheltering from the flighting, and Jabaliya, in the north of the Strip.

Another slogan heard in the footage, which rhymes in Arabic, is: “Listen, listen, Haniyeh, come back home from Turkey; listen, listen, [Osama] Hamdan, come back home from Lebanon.”

Osama Hamdan is a top Hamas official living in Beirut. Ismail Haniyeh used to divide his time between Turkey, where most of his family resides and where he reportedly owns vast real estate properties, and Qatar. After the October 7 onslaught, Ankara reportedly demanded that Hamas leaders leave the country, and Haniyeh has been based in Doha ever since.

In both locations where the footage was apparently filmed, the channel reported that Hamas security forces opened fire on the crowds. In Jabaliya, one person was reportedly killed and three were seriously wounded. The information could not be independently verified, and it is unclear how many people participated in the protests.

Three of the clips were shared by the IDF’s Arabic language spokesperson Avichay Adraee on X on Wednesday, who commented: “The people of Gaza know the cause of the tragedy in the Strip and the consequences of the flood of devastation and terror generated by Sinwar and his clique.”

“Al-Aqsa flood” was the name given by Hamas to its October 7 terror operation, in which it murdered 1,200 in southern Israel, mostly civilians, and kidnapped 253 into the Gaza Strip.

Over the past weeks, videos have emerged intermittently documenting other apparent anti-Hamas rallies in the Strip, including one last Friday, when riots broke out at the Rafah Crossing to Egypt, after a Palestinian teen was shot dead by Hamas police as he tried to grab items from a humanitarian aid truck.

Most of the displaced Palestinians in Rafah — more than half of Gaza’s population — have been sheltering in sprawling makeshift encampments near the Egyptian border amid a spiraling humanitarian crisis.

Since the beginning of the war, aid groups have charged that they are not receiving enough supplies to meet the demands of Gazans in the embattled enclave. Israel has claimed UN agencies are failing to keep up with the goods transfers.

Last week, Israel’s military liaison to the Palestinians COGAT posted photos on X of what it said was “the content of 500 trucks of humanitarian aid on the Gazan side of Kerem Shalom, AFTER Israeli inspection, waiting to be picked up and distributed by UN organizations.”

Various video clips circulated after Israel launched the war against Hamas in October have shown gunmen from the group confiscating trucks carrying aid for civilians. Reports indicate that some of the aid is sold by Hamas members on the black market at highly inflated prices.

Meanwhile, in northern Gaza, the UN’s food agency said on Tuesday that it had paused aid deliveries to the area after convoys of trucks faced gunfire and looting.

The World Food Program (WFP) had resumed deliveries only two days prior after a three-week suspension but its convoy “faced complete chaos and violence due to the collapse of civil order” and its teams reported witnessing “unprecedented levels of desperation,” it said.

In another video from late January, a Gazan man addressed Israeli soldiers in Hebrew and lashed out at the terror group’s leadership for abandoning Gazan civilians and living a life of luxury abroad. “We have nothing to do with all of this. It was Sinwar and Haniyeh,” the man shouted. “Haniyeh is at a restaurant in Turkey, and Sinwar is under the ground, eating meat – while we are here, eating bullets to the head.”

Amid the devastation, is unclear whether Sinwar is still running Hamas on the ground in Gaza. He was reportedly out of contact with the terror group’s leadership abroad since the end of January, but Kan news on Tuesday quoted Israeli officials involved in negotiations saying that they had received messages from Sinwar’s entourage relayed by foreign mediators.

On Sunday, Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said that Hamas’s leadership abroad was looking to replace Sinwar. On Tuesday, Channel 12 quoted officials from an Arab country close to Hamas saying that the terror leader was suffering from complications of pneumonia.

The Arab officials reportedly pressured the terror group to lay down its arms, since it has “achieved nothing,” and relayed Hamas’s own admission that “its military apparatus has disintegrated.”

The scene of the shooting attack near the entrance of Ma'aleh Adumim on Thursday.Credit: Olivier Fitoussi
A 26-year-old Israeli was killed and 11 people were wounded in a shooting attack near the West Bank settlement of Ma'aleh Adumim on Thursday.

A preliminary investigation of the shooting found that three terrorists arrived in two cars at the Al-Zaim checkpoint, just outside of the settlement, and began shooting cars standing in traffic using automatic weapons, including at M-16 and Carlo gun.

Police shot at the three terrorists involved in the attack, killing two and wounding one. Officers later discovered a grenade and ammunition in one of their cars.

Hours after the terror attack, the victim was identified as Matan Elmaliach.

The terrorists have been identified as two brothers – Muhammad Zuahara, 26, and Kadam Zuahara, 31– and Ahmed Alohash, 31, residents of villages in the Bethlehem area. Kadam Zuahara was imprisoned in the past for working in Israel illegally.

Several of the wounded were evacuated to the Shaare Zedek Medical Center and the Hadassah Mount Scopus Hospital, including a pregnant woman.

"Based on the amount of weapons seized from the terrorists, this incident could have ended in a much larger number of casualties," said a senior security official. Police estimate the attack was planned for some time.

National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir arrived at the scene of the attack and spoke to the press. The minister said he expects more barriers and restrictions on movement for Palestinians, adding that "The right to life of the Jewish residents of Judea and Samaria outweighs the right to freedom of movement of the residents of the Palestinian Authority."

Additionally, he said he would continue to distribute weapons to citizens. "A very big disaster was avoided here thanks to the fact that all the police officers have weapons and the citizens have weapons," said Ben-Gvir. "There were those who criticized me for that, but I think that today everyone understands that weapons save lives," he added.

Minister Ben-Gvir at the scene of the shooting attack on Thursday.Credit: Olivier Fitoussi
Commenting on the attack, the heads of councils of the West Bank settlements said that traffic congestion at the checkpoints in general, and at the Al-Zaim checkpoint in particular, are a security risk and called for a solution, emphasizing West Bank roads where both Israeli and Palestinian vehicles travel.

Additionally, Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich demanded that Prime Minister Netanyahu "immediately approve plans for thousands of housing units in Ma'aleh Adumim and the entire area."

Traffic at the scene of the attack at the checkpoint at the entrace to Ma'aleh Adumim on Thursday.Credit: Olivier Fitoussi
Arik Ben-Shimon, whose son Hananya was moderately wounded in the attack, his son shot at the terrorists and was hit with two bullets. He had returned from reserve duty in Khan Yunis last week and was on his way to work as a tour security guard Thursday morning. "He has a long rehabilitation ahead of him, but we're glad he got out alive. And it's clear to us that he's a hero," said Ben-Shimon.

Hamas and Islamic Jihad welcomed the attack but did not take responsibility for it. Both organizations called for increasing confrontations with the army and the settlers, especially in Jerusalem.

Less than a week ago, last Friday, two people were killed and four were injured in a shooting attack at the Ram intersection, near Gedera, where a terrorist fired at people at a bus stop.