RAMALLAH, West Bank: Palestinians were outraged after footage emerged Thursday showing Israeli forces disguised in traditional Arab outfits, including one impersonating a pregnant woman and others appearing to have fake beards, bursting into a West Bank hospital Wednesday night and killing in cold blood a Palestinian man during an arrest raid caught on video.
The raid took place in Hebron, a volatile city in the southern West Bank that has been a frequent flashpoint of anti-Palestinian violence during weeks of unrest.
Jihad Shawar, director of Al-Ahli hospital, said more than 20 undercover Israeli forces entered the hospital overnight. They went to the surgical unit, where they pulled out their guns and stormed a room where Azzam Shalaldeh was being treated for gunshot wounds, he said. The forces handcuffed Shalaldeh and one of his brothers who was in the room, then shot and killed another brother, 27-year-old Abdallah, as he emerged from a bathroom, Shawar said.
“This is an outright crime,” Shawar said. “No one should violate hospitals, but Israel did.”
Osama Najjar, the spokesman for the Palestinian Health Ministry, called the incident an “assassination.”
The Israeli military said troops shot a man at the hospital while they were there to arrest a suspect in a stabbing attack. It claimed the man had tried to attack the troops, but gave no further details and would not say whether undercover troops had participated.
The hospital, however, provided security camera video to The Associated Press showing about a dozen men walking down a hospital corridor, pushing someone covered in a blanket in a wheelchair. The person in the wheelchair flings the blanket off, stands up and, with the other men, draws a gun and continues walking.
The men are joined by what appear to be two women, one in hijab and the other appears to be pregnant, and has her hand on her lower back as she walks with the group of men.
Minutes later, the men, some wearing traditional Palestinian scarves and others donning what appear to be fake beards and moustaches, push a man in a wheelchair — apparently the arrested suspect Azzam Shalaldeh — back down the hall, as perplexed nurses look on.
The Israeli army and police both maintain undercover units that are used primarily in arrest raids. The operations are meant to take place quickly, and Israeli troops are typically stationed nearby to provide backup. The antics of these units have even spawned a primetime drama in Israel called “Fouda,” which tells the story of fictional undercover agents.
Undercover Zionist agents murder Palestinian at hospital, seize patient



