Humanitarian Situation Update #254 | West Bank

The Humanitarian Situation Update is issued by OCHA Occupied Palestinian Territory twice a week. The Gaza Strip is covered on Tuesdays and the West Bank on Thursdays. The Gaza Humanitarian Response Update is issued every other Tuesday. The next Humanitarian Situation Update will be issued on 14 January.

Key Highlights

• Three Palestinians were killed by Israeli forces and three Israeli settlers were killed by armed Palestinians in the West Bank.  
• About 2,000 families have been displaced from Jenin refugee camp since the operation by Palestinian forces began in early December 2024, UNRWA estimates, while the remaining residents are struggling to meet basic needs amid access restrictions.  
• In the first week of 2025, Israeli settlers injured 18 Palestinians across the West Bank, including nine in Silwad village in Ramallah governorate. 
• More than 50 Palestinians were displaced by home demolitions across the West Bank, the majority in Silwan in East Jerusalem.   

Latest Developments (after 6 January 2025) 

• According to initial information, five Palestinians, including at least three children aged eight, 10 and 17 years, were killed in Israeli airstrikes on Tammun, in Tubas, on 7 and 8 January, which also resulted in significant damage. Another Palestinian was shot and killed by Israeli forces who surrounded his house in Talluza, in Nablus, on 7 January.    

Humanitarian Developments (31 December 2024 – 6 January 2025) 

• During the reporting period, Israeli forces killed three Palestinians, including one child, and injured 38 others, including six children, across the West Bank, including East Jerusalem. Armed Palestinians shot and killed three Israeli settlers and injured eight others near Qalqiliya. Three Palestinians, including one child and a member of Palestinian forces, were killed in Jenin refugee camp within the context of the ongoing operation by Palestinian forces. For more information on casualties and further breakdowns of data, please see the monthly West Bank Snapshot.  
• Incidents resulting in fatalities during the reporting period include:  
  • On 3 January, Israeli forces shot and killed an 18-year-old Palestinian male and injured seven others during a raid in Balata refugee camp, east of Nablus, that involved armed clashes with Palestinians who reportedly used explosive devices.  
  • On 3 January, three Palestinians were killed in Jenin refugee camp: a man and his 14-year-old son, where it remains disputed whether they were killed by Palestinian forces or armed Palestinians; and a member of Palestinian forces who was killed in unclear circumstances. Moreover, the man’s 10-year-old daughter sustained a serious neck injury from live ammunition (see below for more information on the situation in Jenin refugee camp).  
  • On 5 January, Israeli forces shot and killed a 17-year-old Palestinian boy during a raid in Askar refugee camp in Nablus that involved clashes between Israeli soldiers and Palestinian stone throwers.  
  • On 5 January, Israeli forces shot and killed a Palestinian man in Meithalun village, south of Jenin, after he stepped out of his house that was surrounded by Israeli forces.  According to community sources, he was left on the ground, bleeding, without medical attention for around two hours. His body has since been withheld by Israeli forces. Between 7 October 2023 and 6 January 2025, OCHA documented 152 Palestinians from the West Bank whose bodies were withheld by Israeli forces, of whom five were subsequently handed over and 147 remain withheld.  
  • On 6 January, armed Palestinians shot and killed three Israeli settlers and injured eight others in an attack targeting a bus and two cars on Route 55, near Al Funduq village in Qalqiliya. Israeli forces subsequently carried out search operations and closed roads and village entrances in the surrounding area.  
• In a recent legal analysis, Diakonia stresses that the use of force against Palestinians in the West Bank has intensified since 7 October 2023, arguing that: “While Israel appears to be applying the more permissive rules on the conduct of hostilities to its use of force in the West Bank …Israel as the occupying power in effective control of territory in the West Bank is bound by the more restrictive rules regulating use of force in law enforcement, emanating from international human rights law (IHRL).” Among other issues, Diakonia highlights the semi-daily raids into Palestinian communities, the use of heavy weaponry such as airstrikes, bulldozers and armoured vehicles, particularly in refugee camps in Jenin, Tulkarm and Tubas, and the resultant widespread destruction of infrastructure, significant civilian casualties and displacement. Emphasizing that Israel’s use of force in the West Bank should comply with the law enforcement framework, the analysis notes that: “[t]here are insufficient grounds to hold that armed individuals and groups in the West Bank against whom Israel is using force are part of the same organisational hierarchy as the organised armed groups in the Gaza Strip….[and] the level of organisation of armed actors in the West Bank and the intensity  of confrontations between them and Israeli forces do not seem to meet the threshold required to establish a separate non-international armed conflict (NIAC).” 
• Since the onset of the operation by Palestinian forces in Jenin refugee camp on 5 December 2024, access to the camp has been heavily restricted. Palestinian forces have engaged in clashes with armed Palestinians and detained 247 Palestinians, according to official sources cited in the media. In total, 14 Palestinians have been killed, including three children, a female journalist and three other bystanders, six members of Palestinian forces and one armed Palestinian. UNRWA estimates that about 650 families, or 3,400 people, currently remain in the camp and face dire conditions, with over 2,000 families displaced to Jenin city and surrounding villages. Key humanitarian concerns include:  
  • Residents have been struggling to meet basic needs, supermarkets are running out of supplies, and access to water and electricity has been minimal. The inability to work or access workplaces has also rendered residents without the financial means to support their families or buy food. 
  • The four UNRWA schools in the camp have been closed since 9 December 2024, resulting in the loss of more than 20 learning days for 1,600 students. Repeated and long-term incursions by Israeli forces over the past two years have already affected the mental health of camp residents, particularly children. 
  • A power outage led to the spoilage of approximately 1,600 vials of insulin in UNRWA’s health clinic, which has been non-operational since the operation began. UNRWA offered camp residents health services five days a week at the nearby Qabatiya health center, but they have largely been unable to visit it, likely due to access difficulties. As a result, about two-thirds of non-communicable disease patients have missed their appointments. 
  • The UNRWA health center inside the camp was temporarily occupied by armed Palestinians until 31 December 2024.  
  • Property and infrastructural damage have been widespread, with reports of the burning of about 29 houses, damage to water tanks and generators, and substantial damage of the laboratory room in the UNRWA health centre when it was hit with a rocket-propelled grenade on the night of 31 December 2024. 
  • The rehabilitation of water networks, which were significantly damaged by previous Israeli military operations, has been on hold, affecting access to water for over 60 per cent of the camp's population while several generators have reportedly been hit, causing intermittent electricity and communication outages in multiple neighbourhoods inside the camp. 
  • UNRWA has been forced to suspend solid waste management operations, leading to the accumulation of solid waste and unhygienic conditions. 
• During the reporting period, OCHA documented 14 incidents perpetrated by Israeli settlers that led to the injury of 18 Palestinians, mainly farmers, and the vandalism of houses and tents, and at least ten vehicles. Key incidents include: 
  • On 3 January, dozens of Israeli settlers, some armed and escorted by Israeli forces, attacked Palestinian farmers on the western outskirts of Silwad village, in the Ramallah governorate. According to local sources, Israeli settlers threw stones at the farmers, who responded by throwing stones, after which additional settlers arrived, fired live ammunition, physically assaulted Palestinians with clubs, sticks and stones, set fire to eight vehicles, and closed off the road between the village and the agricultural land. Nine Palestinian farmers were injured, all due to physical assault. The perpetrators are believed to be from a settlement outpost established in early December 2024 near Silwad; over the past month, OCHA documented eight incidents of attacks and intimidation by Israeli settlers believed to be from this outpost against Palestinians in the village. While the outpost was dismantled by Israeli forces on 2 January, it was rebuilt by Israeli settlers on the same day.  
  • On 3 January 2025, Israeli settlers physically assaulted with sticks and stones Palestinian farmers near Masafer Bani Na'im community, in the Hebron governorate. Six Palestinians were injured. Claiming that farmers had attempted to steal a settler's weapon, the settlers then called Israeli forces, who detained five of the injured Palestinians for four hours. The injured farmers subsequently received medical treatment at a hospital. 
  • On 3 January, Palestinian herders from Burqa village, in Ramallah governorate, found that six of their tents, including three residential structures, had been destroyed, resulting in the displacement of four people. According to the herders, they believe that Israeli settlers from one of the outposts established near their community in mid-December 2024 had perpetrated the attack.  
  • On 6 January, Israeli settlers, believed to be from a newly established outpost near Bardala village in the northern Jordan Valley, raided the village and one of the settlers broke into a primary school, claiming that the students threw stones at them. When teachers and residents gathered to protest the attack, Israeli forces intervened, shot tear gas canisters and live ammunition into the air, and arrested one Palestinian.  
• During the reporting period, OCHA documented the demolition of 15 Palestinian-owned structures across the West Bank. These include 14 demolished due to the lack of Israeli-issued building permits, which are nearly impossible for Palestinians to obtain, and one on punitive grounds. As a result, 52 people were displaced, including 23 children, and at least 47 people were otherwise affected. The majority of displacement took place in one incident in Silwan, in East Jerusalem, on 5 January, when a Palestinian family was forced to self-demolish its two-storey residential building comprising six apartments for lacking building permits. As a result, an extended family of six households comprising 39 people, including 18 children and two people with disabilities, were displaced. The punitive demolition incident, the first such incident since November 2024, took place on 2 January when Israeli forces demolished a two-storey house in Bal'a town, in Tulkarm governorate, belonging to the family of a Palestinian prisoner accused of involvement in a fatal attack near Beit Lid village in Tulkarm, which resulted in the killing of an Israeli reserve soldier in November 2023. The demolition, which involved about 30 military jeeps and two bulldozers, displaced a family of eight people, including two girls.  
• According to a recent report by Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), the organization's mobile clinic in the H2 area of Hebron city was forced to cancel 7 out of 26 planned visits to the area between September and November 2024 due to movement restrictions and overall insecurity in the area. The mobile clinic, which provides primary healthcare and mental health support to residents twice per week, treats about 60 to 70 patients per day and has become a critical lifeline for Palestinian residents of H2, where access to healthcare has been seriously compromised due to movement restrictions, settler violence, and military incursions. According to MSF, these disruptions to health care have profound effects on the Palestinian residents, hampering access to vital healthcare services in an area heavily affected by movement restrictions and violence and where MSF teams are seeing a dramatic decline in children’s mental health and rising symptoms of trauma, including hyperactivity, bed-wetting, nightmares and academic struggle. 

Funding

• As of 9 January 2025, Member States have disbursed approximately US$2.53 billion out of the $3.42 billion (74 per cent) requested to meet the most critical needs in Gaza and the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, between January and December 2024. Moreover, during December 2024, the oPt Humanitarian Fund (oPt HF) managed 111 ongoing projects, totaling $82.2 million, to address urgent needs in the Gaza Strip (86 per cent) and the West Bank (14 per cent). These include 64 projects implemented by international non-governmental organizations (INGOs), 34 by national NGOs and 13 by UN agencies. Of the 77 projects implemented by INGOs or the UN, 46 are being implemented in collaboration with national NGOs. For more information, please see:  
  • Flash Appeal Financial Tracking dashboard.  
  • oPt Humanitarian Fund webpage.  
  • The 2025 Flash Appeal for the OPT. 

* Asterisks indicate that a figure, sentence, or section has been rectified, added, or retracted after the initial publication of this update.