Palestinian gunmen killed weeks after shooting British-Israelis, Israel says

Lucy Dee and her daughters Rina and Maia were killed in an attack in the Jordan Valley last month

Israeli security forces say they have killed two Palestinian gunmen who shot dead a British-Israeli mother and her two daughters in the occupied West Bank last month.

A third militant who had aided the two gunmen was also killed in the raid, Israel's Shin Bet service said. The Palestinian Health Ministry said there had been three fatalities during the raid in the city of Nablus.

Lucy Dee, 48, and her daughters Rina, 15, and Maia, 20, were killed in an attack in the Jordan Valley on 7 April. They were travelling to an event for the Passover holiday when gunmen opened fire at their car near the settlement of Hamra, 10 miles (16km) west of Nablus. Their car crashed and the gunmen fired again at close range. Rina and Maia died at the scene, while Lucy died in hospital three days later.

The rare daytime incursion into Nablus was launched by Israeli security forces as residents were starting their day. The military said they raided an apartment where the men were located. Troops and the suspects exchanged fire and the three men were killed.

Palestinian militant group Hamas said the men killed were members of its armed wing and confirmed they had carried out the attack on last month. Hundreds of people marched in their funeral procession through the streets of the city as gunmen fired into the air.

In a separate incident nearby on Thursday, in the flashpoint village of Huwara, a Palestinian woman stabbed an Israeli soldier and was then shot by him and a second soldier, the military said.

The woman, identified as Iman Odeh, 26, died of her injuries, the Palestinian Health Ministry said.

Smoke rises during a raid by Israeli security forces in the occupied West Bank city of Nablus (AP)

The incidents came after an exchange of cross-border strikes between Israel and Gaza earlier in the week and more than a year of violence that has seen repeated Israeli raids in the West Bank, as well as a series of attacks by Palestinians on Israelis.

The shooting attack on the Dee family, which British Foreign Minister James Cleverly described as "abhorrent", shocked Israelis, who flocked to the Dees' funerals.

In a radio interview with Israeli public broadcaster Kan, Rabbi Leo Dee, the family's father, thanked the Israeli security forces and said he was more consoled by meeting transplant patients this week who had received his wife's organs. "That was a great comfort," Rabbi Dee said.

In Nablus, witnesses said Israeli undercover units surrounded a house in the old city before a gun battle which left the structure badly damaged by explosions and bullet holes.

Since the beginning of the year, more than 100 Palestinians, most of them fighters in militant groups but some of them civilians including children, have been killed by Israeli forces and at least 18 Israelis and international citizens have been killed.

Hamas spokesman Hazem Qassem threatened revenge for the killing of the gunmen who were barricaded in the house. "The occupation will pay the price for its crimes against our people and for the assassination today," he said.

Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, said that those who harm Israelis are eventually reached. "It doesn't matter where you try to hide – we will find you," he said.

Nabil Abu Rud, spokesman for Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, blamed Israel for the escalation and called on the US to intervene.

Reuters