During an exchange of fire near Jenin, an IDF officer was killed.

By Aryeh Savir, TPS

An IDF officer was killed Tuesday in a clash with terrorists near the Gilboa crossing, in the Jenin area in Samaria.

The IDF stated that its observations identified two suspects in the area of the security barrier near the Arab village of Jalama. The IDF forces that were rushed to the point surrounded the suspects and commenced an arrest procedure, during which the suspects shot at the troops.

The soldiers shot back at the suspects and neutralized them. As a result of the exchange of fire, an IDF officer was killed.

After the exchange of fire, the Gilboa was closed to vehicle traffic until Friday morning. The passage of workers and goods will continue as usual.

The two terrorists were identified as Ahmad Ayman Ibrahim and Abdul Rahman Hani Abed.

Abed was a member of the Palestinian Authority’s security forces, the third time in two weeks that a PA security official is involved in a terror attack. Some reports say that the terrorists were wearing IDF uniforms.

Fatah claimed responsibility for the attack.

A similar shooting attack occurred in the same area earlier in the day. Terrorists shot at a tractor working for the Ministry of Defense at the security barrier near the Jalama checkpoint. The tractor driver was not injured, but the tractor was heavily damaged.

Kan 11 news recently reported an uptick in the number of shooting attacks in Judea and Samaria since the beginning of the year. About 60 such attacks have occurred since the beginning of 2022, compared to about 50 shooting attacks in all of 2021, 48 in 2020, and 61 in 2019.

Israeli analyst Yoni Ben Menachem, of the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs (JCPA), reported last month that there are “alarming signs of security escalation” in Judea and Samaria and Iran is pushing the Islamic Jihad to try and take over the Samaria area, especially around Jenin.

Over the past year, the Islamic Jihad organization, under Iran’s guidance, has been working to establish an independent territory that will not be subject to the power of the Palestinian Authority.

In the city of Jenin and in the neighboring villages, there are already several hundred armed terrorists, thousands of weapons, and large quantities of ammunition. The Islamic Jihad managed to push the PA completely out of the Jenin area and established a new military framework called the “Jenin Battalion” which also includes armed activists from other groups such as Fatah’s “al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades” and Hamas.

This framework began to spread towards the areas of Shechem and Tulkarm and carried out shooting attacks against IDF forces and Israeli civilians.