Two children were among three Palestinians from the same family killed in a strike by Israeli forces in the West Bank on Wednesday, Palestinian officials said.
The governor of Tubas said that the strike in the town of Tammun killed Adam Besharat, 23, and his cousins Hamza Besharat, 10, and Reda Besharat, eight.
The Israeli army initially said it had “attacked terrorists” in Tammun. It later said the incident was “under review” due to “various reports about the effects of the strike”.
The West Bank-based Palestinian Authority's Foreign Ministry condemned the strike as a “heinous crime”.
It called the incident “a clear demonstration of the violations committed by the Israeli government against the Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip”, where Israel is waging a war, and “a clear violation of international law”.
The strike that killed Adam, Hamza and Reda Besharat occurred when Israeli soldiers raided several houses in Tammun, the city's mayor told the Palestinian news agency Wafa.
The governor of Tubas, Ahmed Asaad, and Adam's mother, Abla Besharat, said that the cousins were sitting on the ground in front of the house when they were attacked by an airplane.
“I heard a noise and found my son here,” Ms Besharat told Reuters as she pointed to a blood-stained wall and a sidewalk. “He was breathing his last.”
“See [Israeli troops] he wouldn't let me get close to him. A large group came, forced us inside, and took away our phones. They didn't let me see him. They went inside and took blankets from the house and rolled them up and took them with them.”
He said Reda also died at the scene, but Hamza was seriously injured and alive when the soldiers took him away.
“They didn't allow the ambulance to come in. His mother kept shouting but they didn't care.”
Mr Asaad told AFP that Israeli forces took the cousins away after the attack. Their bodies were later returned to the Palestinian Authority for funeral rites.
Photos and videos posted online on Wednesday evening showed mourners preparing the boys' bodies for burial and carrying them through crowded streets.
The Tammun strike was the second in two days.
On Tuesday, the Israeli army said it had killed two members of an “armed terrorist group” who fired on soldiers who had raided the village. The Ministry of Health in Palestine said two men, aged 18 and 24, were killed.
The previous day, three Israelis were killed in a shooting incident involving a bus and two cars in the village of al-Funduq, 25 kilometers southwest of Tammun.
The militant wing of Hamas and the Fatah-affiliated Palestinian Islamic Jihad and al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades claimed responsibility for the attack on Wednesday evening.
There has been an outbreak of violence in the West Bank since Hamas attacked Israel on October 7, 2023 and the subsequent war in Gaza.
More than 800 Palestinians have been killed, the UN said, as Israeli forces stepped up their daily search and arrest campaign.
Israel says it is trying to stop attacks on Palestinians in the West Bank and Israel, where at least 44 Israelis have been killed, according to the UN.
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