NABLUS, West Bank (Reuters) -Israeli forces shot and killed a Palestinian gunman on Thursday during a clash in the occupied West Bank, the military and Palestinian officials said.
The incident occurred in the Palestinian city of Nablus, which the military said soldiers had entered to detain a Palestinian, whom it did not identify.
“Some Palestinian gunmen began firing at the soldiers, prompting them to respond and kill one of them,” a military spokesman wrote on Twitter. “The wanted man was arrested. There were no casualties among our forces.”
The gunman was identified as Bakeer Hashash, a member of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’s Fatah movement, the group said. Activists distributed posters of Hashash clutching an M16 assault rifle.
Abbas blamed Israel for the death. “All sides must bear responsibility before the situation spirals out of control,” he said.
Abbas’s security forces organised a military funeral march for Hashash in Nablus, attended by hundreds of Palestinians.
(Reporting by Jeffrey Heller, Ali Sawafta and Nidal al-Mughrabi; Editing by Kim Coghill, William Maclean)
