TEL AVIV, January 30. /TASS/. Up to 500 armed radicals have been neutralized by Israeli forces in counter-terrorist raids in the West Bank since October 7, 2023, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said at a meeting with Israeli soldiers in the settlement of Eli in the West Bank.

Earlier in the day, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said that a raid had been conducted in the Ibn Sina Hospital in the city of Jenin, West Bank. The operation targeted a radical cell, which plotted a terror attack in the near future.

According to the IDF, more than 2,900 wanted persons have been detained in the West Bank since October 7, 2023, when Hamas staged a massive attack on Israeli territory. More than 1,300 of those detained are suspected of having links to the radical Palestinian movement.

Tensions flared up again in the Middle East on October 7 after militants from the Gaza Strip-based radical Palestinian group Hamas launched a surprise incursion on Israeli territory, killing many Israeli kibbutz residents living near the Gaza border and abducting more than 240 Israelis, including women, children and the elderly. Hamas described its attack as a response to Israeli authorities’ aggressive actions against the Al-Aqsa Mosque on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem’s Old City. Israel declared a total blockade of the Gaza Strip and launched bombardments of the enclave and some areas in Lebanon and Syria, as well as a ground operation against Hamas in the Gaza Strip. Clashes are also reported in the West Bank.