A bullet fired from the West Bank overnight smashed through a window in an Israeli village, narrowly missing a baby, Friday reports said.
The bullet hit a home in Ram-On, a farming community adjacent to the northern West Bank separation barrier.
Residents of the settlement reported hearing a gunshot overnight, prompting security guards and IDF troops to sweep the area.
A family then reported that the bullet hit a window above a sleeping baby’s bed. A photo from the scene showed shards of glass in a crib, but the child was not hurt.
Ram-On’s community manager, Erez Dior, said the area had been quiet since the separation fence went up 20 years ago, but that the security situation had recently deteriorated, sparking fears among residents.
“This is definitely an escalation. We hear gunfire and reports of Palestinians attempting to fire rockets,” Dior said, according to the Walla news site. “This raises concerns. There’s a fear that the area will become like the area around Gaza.”
גל הטרור הערבי לא עוצר: 00:30 ירי בוצע מפאתי ג׳נין לכיוון הישוב רם און. קליע פגע בחלון בית ונפל על מיטת תינוק. אין נפגעים.
04:52 ירי לעבר עמדת כוחותינו סמוך למבוא דותן. אין נפגעים. pic.twitter.com/EkM6Y2rRgD— הלל ביטון רוזן | Hallel Bitton Rosen (@BittonRosen) October 6, 2023
Last month, Palestinians in the northern West Bank attempted to launch a homemade rocket at Ram-On.
It was at least the seventh attempt by a group calling itself the al-Ayyash Battalion — apparently named for a notorious Hamas bombmaker killed by Israel — to fire rockets at Israeli towns and West Bank settlements in recent months.
The group said it had launched a rocket from the Jenin area at Ram-On. There were no reports of damage or injuries as a result of the launch. It was unclear how far the projectile flew.
Violence has surged across the West Bank over the past year and a half, with a rise in Palestinian shooting attacks against Israeli civilians and troops, near-nightly arrest raids by the military, and an uptick in revenge attacks by extremist Jewish settlers against Palestinians.
