Demolishing Palestinians houses has become an almost daily practice of the Israeli occupation

JENIN, West Bank, January 31 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) – As the world attention is focusing on the upcoming U.S. aggression on Iraq,  Israel continues its occupational practices of murder and abductions against the Palestinian population. 

Israeli soldiers shot dead two Palestinians early Friday, January 31, as Israeli tanks launched an incursion into Jenin a day after its incursion in Hebron.

The two Palestinians were slain as a major armored column of 40 tanks and bulldozers returned to the northern West Bank town less than 24 hours after pulling out following a previous attack in which four Palestinians were killed Tuesday, January 28.

Fireman Hassan Hassan, 52, and Iyad Abu Lel, 23, an activist of the Islamic resistance  movement Hamas, were killed after Israeli troops surrounded the city fire station, Palestinian officials said.

A colleague of Hassan said he was shot dead by an Israeli soldier as he was trying to escape the building, but an Israeli military spokesman claimed he was killed by a bullet fired by Abu Lel.

‘Abduction’

In the northern West Bank, Israeli troops also abducted seven other Palestinians in the West Bank, occupied since a spate of Palestinian resistance attacks in June 2002.

The Israeli army claimed the seven Palestinians were suspected of involvement in anti-Israeli attacks.

‘Demolition’

Israeli troops dynamited two family homes of Palestinian activists, In Al-Khalil (Hebron), which was the target of a major Israeli army incursion the day before aimed at stamping out resistance fighters who have killed more than 20 soldiers and settlers in recent month, despite the re-occupation.

The policy of razing activists' homes was slammed by international human rights organization  as collective punishment and illegal.

Israeli troops dynamited the house of Mahmud Amer from the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, an armed group with links to Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, and that of Rifaat al-Jurdi from the Hamas resistance group, sources said.

Around 600 hardliner settlers live under massive Israeli army protection in Hebron, surrounded by about 120,000 Palestinians.

Since last year the Israeli army has again reoccupied almost all of the West Bank, including every major city and town with the exception of Jericho.

Israeli troops and armored had stormed into Al-Khalil (Hebron) Thursday, January 30, while undercover troops killed two Palestinians in Tulkarem,

Security officials said five Palestinians were abducted as 20 armored vehicles deployed in the city center. Palestinian officials said the troops had also shut down a television and two radio stations.