JERUSALEM : The Israeli military claimed that Palestinian insurgents launched six rockets from the Gaza Strip early on Thursday, hours after an Israeli army raid in the occupied West Bank ignited a bloody gunbattle that resulted in the deaths of 11 Palestinians.

The Nablus raid on Wednesday morning appears to be the catalyst for the rocket attacks, which Palestinian militant groups did not immediately claim responsibility for.

According to the Israeli military, five of the rockets fired toward Ashkelon and Sderot were intercepted by air defences. One missile touched down in a wide field. Then, Israeli aircraft attacked a number of targets in central and northern Gaza. In Gaza or Israel, no injuries were reported.

According to health officials, the dead in Nablus were three Palestinian men, aged 72, 66, and 61, as well as a 16-year-old boy. Numerous others suffered injuries.

The likelihood of additional bloodshed increased as it was one of the bloodiest battles in almost a year of fighting in the West Bank and east Jerusalem. While the militant Hamas group in Gaza claimed its patience was "running out," Israeli police said they were on high alert. Another militant group, Islamic Jihad, vowed to strike back.

The four-hour operation in Nablus, a city known as a militant stronghold, caused extensive damage to a centuries-old marketplace.

In one touching scene, a distraught doctor mistakenly declared a man dead after realizing it was his father. Another amateur video showed two men being shot as they ran through the street. The men appeared to be unarmed.

Since a string of deadly Palestinian attacks in Israel last spring, Israel has increased its arrest raids of wanted militants in the West Bank.

According to Israeli officials, these operations are equivalent to "mowing the lawn" and are required to stop a bad situation from getting worse. However, the raids haven't done much to stop the violence, and in situations like Wednesday's operation, they might even make retaliation more likely.

The Israeli military claimed it entered Nablus, the commercial hub of the West Bank, to detain three militants believed to be responsible for earlier shooting incidents. In connection with the murder of an Israeli soldier last fall, the main suspect was wanted.

After intelligence services located the men in a hideout, according to Richard Hecht, the forces moved swiftly. Israeli forces reportedly asked the men to surrender as they surrounded the building, but instead, they started shooting. A militant was shot and killed as he attempted to flee the structure. He claimed that after that, the military launched missiles at the home, levelling it and killing the other two men.

The military said others hurled rocks and explosives at the troops, and officials released a video taken from inside an armoured vehicle as crowds of Palestinian youths pelted it with stones. There were no Israeli casualties.

According to Ahmad Aswad, the head nurse of the cardiology department, the city's Najah Hospital was overrun by the influx of injured people. The Associated Press was informed by the 36-year-old medic that many of the patients had been shot in the chest, head, and thighs. He declared, "They shot to kill."

He and a colleague skillfully removed a bullet from a 61-year-old man's heart in a moment that he later claimed would haunt him. They examined the man's face after the commotion died down, and they declared their patient dead. It was Abdelaziz Ashqar, the father of his coworker. Elias Ashqar, his colleague, lost it and remained silent. Aswad observed, "It didn't feel like we were in reality." In the Old City of Nablus, people stared at the rubble that had been a large home in the centuries-old marketplace.

Security footage with a time stamp that was shared widely online appeared to show two young men running down a street. Although the two men did not appear to be carrying weapons, the shooting's sequence of events was not captured on camera.

The military was looking into the video, according to Hecht, who referred to it as "problematic." Six of the dead, including the three people the raid was intended to target, were identified as members of various Palestinian militant groups. It wasn't immediately clear if the other people belonged to armed organizations. Numerous thousands of people crowded the streets while chanting in favor of the militants as the bodies were carried through the crowd on stretchers.

In anticipation of violence, the Israeli police force announced that it was stepping up security in east Jerusalem and the West Bank. Ten people were killed by Israeli soldiers in a comparable raid in the northern West Bank last month. 

The next day, seven people were killed when a lone Palestinian gunman opened fire close to a synagogue in an east Jerusalem settlement. Days later, an Israeli arrest raid elsewhere in the West Bank resulted in the deaths of five Palestinian militants.

Following that, a Palestinian car rammed into a car in Jerusalem, killing three Israelis, including two young brothers. The ultranationalists who control the government have called for tougher measures against Palestinian militants and pledged to firmly establish Israeli rule in the occupied West Bank.

A number of West Bank settler leaders are members of the cabinet. The settlement council, Yesha, announced that Israeli planning officials had approved nearly 2,000 new homes in settlements throughout the West Bank, a move that could escalate tensions. Settlements constructed on occupied lands, according to the Palestinians and the majority of the international community, are forbidden and a barrier to peace.

In the West Bank and east Jerusalem, which Israel conquered in 1967 and which the Palestinians sought for a future state, more than 700,000 settlers now reside. He urged both sides to refrain from taking actions that might "inflame tensions," such as possibly approving brand-new settlements.

Israeli action follows a harsh condemnation of settlement building from the U.N. president. What would have been a stronger, legally binding council resolution was prevented by the United States.

Israeli officials allegedly agreed to halt taking unilateral action to block the resolution, according to American diplomats. It would seem that Israel's approval of new settlements disproves that assertion.

Riyad Mansour, the Palestinian ambassador to the United Nations, pleaded with all nations "to put an end to these massacres against our people."

Hamas' "patience is running out," according to Abu Obeida, a spokesman for the militant organization in charge in the Gaza Strip.

Late on Wednesday, Palestinian protesters set tires on fire along Gaza's border with Israel. Ziyad Al-Nakhala, the leader of the Islamic Jihad, described the Israeli raid as "a huge crime." According to an AP count, this year has seen the deaths of nearly 60 Palestinians in the West Bank and east Jerusalem.

According to statistics provided by the Israeli rights organization B'Tselem, last year saw the highest death toll among Palestinians in those regions since 2004 at close to 150. Palestinian attacks claimed the lives of about 30 Israelis.

Source: AP News