Genipalia.. The tragedy of the century

It was not an absurd or spontaneous statement made by the extremist Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich last January, when he called for genocide and ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians in the cities of Nablus and Jenin in the northern West Bank, as Tel Aviv is doing in Jabalia in the northern Gaza Strip.

This came in Smotrich's comment on the killing of three Israeli settlers and the wounding of seven others in a shooting attack near the settlement of Kedumim, the settlement where he lives, east of Qalqilya in the northern West Bank.

"Al-Funduq (a village in Qalqilya), Nablus and Jenin must be like Jabalia, so that Kfar Saba does not become like the infidels of Gaza," Smotrich said in a statement.

This call coincided with several demands by the settlers, in which they called on the Israeli Minister of Defense, Yisrael Katz, to transfer the Gaza model to the West Bank, to burn all its properties, blow up its buildings, kill its citizens, and turn it into rubble, and not to limit the war of extermination to Gaza.

The Israeli army immediately responded to these calls, launching a large-scale aggression two weeks ago on the city of Jenin and its camp, the city of Tulkarm and the Tulkarm and Nur Shams camps, then expanding the scope of the aggression to include the Tubas governorate, where the Far’a and Tamoun camps are located, leaving about 50 martyrs through continuous bloody bombardment, a tight siege that prevents the entry of food, water and medicine, and forcing the citizens in the camps to flee.

Yesterday, the aggression escalated and imposed on Jenin camp a catastrophic tragedy unprecedented in the history of the West Bank, when about 23 homes were blown up at once in a terrifying scene that shook the walls, doors and windows of homes for several kilometers, for the occupation to impose on the people of the camp the bitterness of a new displacement suffering, as they have lost more than 100 homes that were demolished, burned or blown up by the occupation.

Netanyahu's government met Smotrich's demands, and at that time held an urgent session of the Security Cabinet, which was devoted to discussing the situation in the West Bank. Netanyahu made decisions to undermine the dream and project of a Palestinian state, by continuing to terrorize citizens. He himself threatened to find the killers and hold them and all those who helped them accountable, "without letting anyone escape punishment." Meanwhile, Defense Minister Yisrael Katz tweeted on the X platform that "Israel will not allow the reality in the (West Bank) to be the same as it was in the Gaza Strip," and that "whoever follows Hamas's path in Gaza and sponsors the killing and harming of Jews will pay a heavy price," according to his expression.

Israel has exploited the Al-Funduq shooting incident to vent its anger on the northern West Bank. It needs no justification. Its plans have been in place for many years, and its actions on the ground prove that it is waging a long-term war. For many years now, the West Bank has been the scene of army incursions and a target for settler attacks.

The besieged and oppressed Jenin was and still is a strategic target for the occupation, and there is no doubt that the pictures and scenes of the massive destruction there make it resemble Jabalia, and what can we say except (Jenin) the tragedy of the century, in a brief reference to Jenin, Jabalia and all the cities and camps of the homeland.