Israeli army arrests four suspects in deadly West Bank shooting

The army said the suspects were arrested in a northern West Bank village near Jenin

Members of the Israeli army special forces take part in a "terrorist attack" simulation at a school in northern Israel, near the border with Jordan, on October 26. AFP

The Israeli military said on Sunday that troops arrested four Palestinians believed to have taken part in a deadly shooting in the occupied West Bank.

In Thursday’s incident, at least one Palestinian gunman opened fire on a car filled with Jewish seminary students next to a West Bank settlement outpost.

Yehuda Dimentman, 25, was killed and two others were wounded near Homesh, which is considered illegal by the Israeli government.

The army said the suspects were arrested in the northern West Bank village of Silat Al Haaretia, near Jenin, and “were transferred to the security forces for further investigation and the weapon of the suspect who carried out the shooting was captured".

Israeli authorities did not immediately identify the suspects.

The Israeli border police released a photo of a cache of assault rifles and ammunition it said belonged to the suspects.

Prime Minister Naftali Bennett congratulated the security forces for the arrest.

Homesh, in the northern West Bank, was dismantled as part of Israel’s withdrawal from the Gaza Strip in 2005. But in recent years, Israeli settlers have returned to pray and established an unauthorised outpost at the site.

The car in which Mr Dimentman was travelling was riddled with bullets after leaving a Jewish seminary in the outpost where he had been studying.

The Israeli military said that early Sunday, hundreds of setters entered the outpost, trying to establish “illegal structures” at the site.

It said Israeli forces tried to block the crowd, and settlers vandalised military property and blocked the movement of troops. It said one soldier was slightly wounded after being hit by a resident’s vehicle.

The developments come after weeks of increased Palestinian-Israeli violence.

Earlier this month, a Palestinian attacker stabbed and seriously wounded an ultra-Orthodox Jew outside Jerusalem’s Old City.

And just over a week before that, a Hamas militant opened fire in the Old City, killing an Israeli man.

At the same time, settler violence against Palestinians has risen, particularly in the northern West Bank.

Israel captured East Jerusalem and the West Bank in the 1967 Arab-Israeli war, and the territories are now home to more than 700,000 Israel settlers.

Most of the international community considers Israeli settlements illegal obstacles to peace.

The Palestinians seek East Jerusalem and the West Bank as parts of a future independent state.