Israel arrests 11 and destroys West Bank building

The Israeli army arrested 11 Palestinians across the West Bank overnight and blew up the home of two brothers accused of anti…

The Israeli army arrested 11 Palestinians across the West Bank overnight and blew up the home of two brothers accused of anti-Israeli attacks, military sources and witnesses said.

The 11 arrested were on a list drawn up by the Israeli intellligence services, the army said. Six were rounded up in the city of Tulkarm.

The house blown up in Dura, in the southern West Bank, was the family home of brothers Anais and Akram al-Namura, who were jailed after a series of attacks, including a bomb blast which killed an Israeli officer.

Some 15 people lived in the three-storey dwelling, which belonged to the father of the brothers, Mahmud Talal al-Namura, witnesses said.

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Since the beginning of August the Israeli army has destroyed more than 40 houses of suicide bombers and others linked to attacks in a measure of retaliation and a bid to dissuade others.

The practice has been denounced by human rights groups as collective punishment outlawed by the Geneva conventions.

Meanwhile the army said that one of nine people killed in a massive military incursions into the Gaza Strip on Monday night was a prominent member of the armed wing of the Islamist movement Hamas.

Yassin Nasser, 53, was a bomb-maker for the Ezzedin al-Qassam brigades, the army said.