CAIRO, September 5. /TASS/. The death toll from Israeli military and police actions in the West Bank has reached 691 since the country started an operation in Gaza, the Palestinian Health Ministry said.

According to officials, so far 5,700 Palestinians have been injured in various parts of the West Bank since October last year. Since last Wednesday alone, when the Israel Defense Forces started major raids in several towns and refugee camps, 39 Arabs have been killed and some 145 others wounded in the region.

The ministry pointed out that the largest number of Arab casualties occurred in Jenin, Tulkarm and Tubas, which saw the fiercest clashes between the Israeli military and Palestinian resistance groups.

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 hostages, including children, women and elderly people. Israel has declared a complete siege of the Gaza Strip and has started delivering strikes on that area and parts of Lebanon and Syria. That was followed by an Israeli ground operation in the enclave that is ongoing to this day.