Israeli strike, West Bank violence kill five Palestinians, officials say

JERUSALEM, July 23 - An Israeli airstrike killed two Palestinians in northern Gaza on Thursday, medics there said, and three others were shot dead in the occupied West Bank, according to Palestinian authorities and the Israeli military.

Israel's military said it had targeted militants in Gaza.

An Israeli military official said a civilian had killed two Palestinians in the West Bank after they stabbed and wounded an Israeli during a dispute.

The Israeli military said its forces shot a third Palestinian in the West Bank after a separate stabbing attack that wounded an Israeli soldier.

Israel is launching nearly daily strikes on Gaza, in what it says are attacks on Hamas militants, more than nine months after a U.S.-backed ceasefire in the enclave.

More than 1,160 Palestinians and four Israeli soldiers have been reported killed since the fragile truce began in October, according to Palestinian and Israeli tallies, respectively. Palestinian medics say most of the dead are civilians.

In the West Bank, the Palestinian Authority's official news agency WAFA said the Israeli military and settlers attacked a group of Palestinians from the village of Beit Furik as they were attempting to put out a fire nearby.

An Israeli military official said "friction" broke out between Israeli settlers and Palestinians during efforts to extinguish the fire, and two Palestinians stabbed an Israeli.

The official, who asked not to be named, said an Israeli "civilian", an apparent reference to a settler, then killed the two Palestinians.

Tensions have been high in the West Bank amid escalating settler violence and Israeli plans to build more settlements on the territory that Palestinians see as a key part of a future state.

About 700,000 Israeli settlers live among 2.7 million Palestinians in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.

Most foreign governments say Israel's settlement activity in the West Bank — where the Palestinian Authority exercises limited self-rule — is illegal under international law. Israel disputes this view. REUTERS