<div style="text-align: justify; "><b style="font-size: 1rem;">There have been intense exchanges of fire between Israeli forces and armed Palestinian militants in Jenin refugee camp, in the occupied West Bank.</b><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The Israeli military began what appears to be one of its most extensive operations in the territory in years with drone strikes early on Monday.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Nine Palestinians have been killed and 100 injured, health officials say.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Israel said it was putting a stop to Jenin being "a refuge for terrorism". Palestinians accused it of a war crime.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The Israeli military said there was no specific timeline for ending the operation, but that it could be "a matter of hours or a few days".</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Jenin has become a stronghold of a new generation of Palestinian militants who have become deeply frustrated by the Palestinian Authority's aging leadership and the restrictions of the Israeli occupation.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The city has seen repeated Israeli military raids in the past year as local Palestinians have carried out deadly attacks on Israelis. Other Palestinian attackers have hidden there.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">In 2002, during the second Palestinian intifada, Israeli forces launched a full-scale incursion in Jenin. At least 52 Palestinian militants and civilians and 23 Israeli soldiers were killed during 10 days of intense fighting.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">As well as the hum of drones overhead, regular bursts of gunfire and the loud thuds of explosions came throughout the day from the densely populated refugee camp, which is home to some 18,000 people and is now declared a closed Israeli military zone.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Acrid smoke from burning tyres lit during protests also hung in the air above the city centre. A few young Palestinians were out on the streets, standing close to shuttered shops and staring nervously in the direction of the camp.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The Israeli military has cut off telephone communications and the electricity supply to the camp, making it difficult to get an accurate picture of what is happening. Palestinian medics have also been struggling to reach the dozens of injured there.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">At the Palestinian hospital by the main entrance to the camp the mood was grim.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">One man told the BBC: "I met my brother's friend. I went up to him and had barely said a few words when he dropped on the ground. I went to run away, then I got hit by two bullets."</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Another man said there was a "massacre" in the camp.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">"There are children and civilians and they're not letting them out," he added. "Our electricity is cut, they have dug up all our roads. The camp will be destroyed."</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Jovana Arsenijevic of the medical charity Médecins Sans Frontières told the BBC she was at a hospital that had seen more than 90 patients wounded by gunfire or shrapnel from explosive devices.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The Israeli military said it was acting on precise intelligence and did not to seek to harm civilians, but many have been caught in the crossfire.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The military allowed about 500 Palestinian families to leave the camp on Monday night. Some raised their hands or waved makeshift white flags in a gesture of surrender.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">People told the BBC that some men and teenaged boys had been stopped by soldiers, and kept behind.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The first drone strike overnight targeted an apartment that the military said was being used as a hideout for Palestinians who had attacked Israelis and as a "joint operational command centre" for the Jenin Brigades - a unit made up of different Palestinian militant groups including Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Drones were used for further air strikes and a brigade-size force of troops was deployed in what a military spokesman described as a "counter-terrorism operation" focused on seizing weapons and breaking "the safe haven mindset of the camp, which has become a hornet's nest".</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">In the past year and a half, Palestinians behind some 50 attacks targeting Israelis have come from Jenin, according to the military.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">As armed Palestinians began fighting back from inside the camp, the Jenin Brigades said: "We will fight the occupation [Israeli] forces until the last breath and bullet, and we work together and unified from all factions and military formations."</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The Palestinian health ministry said nine Palestinians had been killed by Israeli forces, including three in the overnight drone strike. They all appeared to be young men or in their late teens - some confirmed as belonging to armed groups.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The ministry warned that the death toll might rise because 20 of the injured were in a critical condition.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Another Palestinian was killed by Israeli fire during a related protest near the West Bank city of Ramallah, it added.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The Israeli military said the Palestinians killed in Jenin were affiliated to militant groups.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Troops had also apprehended some 50 militants during the operation, and seized weapons and ammunition, it added.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">On Monday evening, Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu praised its forces for entering what he called the "nest of terrorists" and asserted that they were doing so "with minimal injury to civilians".</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">"We will continue this action as long as necessary in order to restore quiet and security," he added.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">There was a furious response to the operation from the Palestinian Authority Prime Minister, Mohammed Shtayyeh.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">"What's going on is an attempt to erase the refugee camp completely and displace the residents," he said.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Neighbouring Jordan said the operation was "a clear violation of international humanitarian law", but the US expressed its support for what it called "Israel's security and right to defend its people against Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and other terrorist groups".</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Israeli Foreign Minister Eli Cohen said the plan was not to expand the military operation outside Jenin, but already Palestinian protests have reached the Hamas-governed Gaza Strip. And the longer this action goes on in Jenin, the greater the risk of another dangerous, wider escalation.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The Jenin Brigade group has said its militants will fight back with their "last breath and bullet"</div><div style="text-align: justify;">There has been a surge of violence in the West Bank in recent months.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">On 20 June, seven Palestinians were killed during an Israeli raid in Jenin which saw the military's first use of an attack helicopter in the West Bank in years.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The next day, two Hamas gunmen shot dead four Israelis near the settlement of Eli, 40km (25 miles) to the south.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">A Palestinian man was later shot dead during a rampage by hundreds of settlers in the nearby town of Turmusaya.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">That week also saw three Palestinian militants from Jenin killed in a rare Israeli drone strike.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Since the start of the year, more than 140 Palestinians - both militants and civilians - have been killed by Israeli forces or settlers in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem, while another 36 have been killed in the Gaza Strip.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Twenty-four Israelis, two foreigners and a Palestinian worker have been killed in attacks or apparent attacks by Palestinians in Israel and the West Bank. All were civilians except one off-duty serving soldier and a member of the Israeli security forces. BBC</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify; ">bnbd24/kh</div>