DUBAI, December 2. /TASS/. The Israel Defense Forces is attacking cities in the West Bank, Al Jazeera television reported.

According to the report, Israeli troops are attacking the cities of Jenin, Qalqilya and Hebron, and also carrying out military operations in settlements near Nablus and Salfit, where they are arresting Palestinians.

IDF and Palestinian resistance fighters are also engaged in clashes in the Gaza Strip. According to Al Mayadeen television, street battles are taking place in the northwest of the Palestinian enclave, while the Israeli Navy is "shelling the coast near Khan Yunis and Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip."

The situation in the Middle East sharply escalated following an incursion of Hamas militants from the Gaza Strip into Israel on October 7, accompanied by killings of residents of Israeli settlements near the border and taking more than 200 hostages, including children, women and elderly people. Hamas has cast the attack as a response to Israeli actions against the Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem.