DUBAI, September 19. /TASS/. At least 689 Palestinians as well as 22 Israelis have been killed in the West Bank and East Jerusalem since October 7, 2023, the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) reported.

According to its report, "these include 671 killed by Israeli forces, eleven by Israeli settlers, and seven where it remains unknown whether the perpetrators were Israeli forces or settlers."

The document noted that 22 Israelis, including 15 servicemen of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) have been killed in the West Bank and East Jerusalem over the same period.

Tensions flared up again in the Middle East on October 7, 2023, when militants from the Gaza-based Palestinian radical group Hamas staged a surprise incursion into Israeli territory from the Gaza Strip. Hamas described its attack as a response to the aggressive actions of Israeli authorities against the Al-Aqsa Mosque on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem’s Old City. In response, Israel has declared a state of war readiness; announced a total blockade of the Gaza Strip, home to 2.3 million Palestinians; and began delivering air strikes on the enclave and certain parts of Lebanon and Syria, followed by a ground operation in the enclave. Clashes are underway in the West Bank as well.