IDF soldiers walk toward the bodies of the Palestinian gunmen killed in the clash
Chantal Da Silva – NBC News Oct 23, 2026
Israel ordered a “full lockdown” of the occupied West Bank Friday after the Israeli military said two of its soldiers were killed in a shootout that also left two Palestinian gunmen dead.
The two suspects, both Palestinians from Hebron, were armed with an M16 rifle and a handgun, Israel said.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said soldiers would go “house to house” in areas the attackers were believed to be from, evacuate residents and destroy “terrorist infrastructure” and “infrastructure for settlement” would be built.
A cordon would be imposed around the cities of Hebron and Halhul and Israel would consider “extending this model to other cities as well,” he said speaking on camera from Hebron, where the incident occurred, and wearing a bulletproof vest.
“We are prepared for a large-scale operation in Judea and Samaria,” he said, using a name employed by some Israelis for the West Bank.
The incident comes just days before a crucial election that will decide whether Netanyahu can hold on to power.
There has been a recent surge in Israeli settler violence and military activity in the West Bank centered on the start of the olive harvesting season, with Palestinians, activists and American journalists among those attacked and detained. Netanyahu has previously blamed “a handful of young juvenile delinquents” for instances of settler violence.
In his comments Friday, Netanyahu praised settlers in the West Bank as “heroic,” saying they were “an example to the people of Israel and to the State of Israel.”
Netanyahu’s office said it instructed the Israel Defense Forces to “impose a closure” on Hebron and to prepare for a “full lockdown” across the entire West Bank starting Friday. It gave no further details on the planned closure of the territory.
In comments following an emergency meeting with his security cabinet and top military and security officials, Netanyahu blamed Hamas for the shooting and said the militant group was “planning a major attack aimed at murdering innocent civilians.”
He cited “large quantities of weapons and ammunition discovered,” but did not provide further details on the attack. He did not say whether the injured included soldiers or civilians.
The order to lock down the West Bank came hours after the Israeli military said it had killed two people after a shooting attack in which at least five people were initially reported injured.
The Israeli military later said two soldiers had been killed in the attack. It said three additional soldiers were lightly injured and evacuated to receive medical treatment at a hospital.
Magen David Adom, Israel’s primary emergency service, had earlier said it received a report at around 7:15 a.m. local time (12:15 a.m. ET) of multiple casualties following the attack near the Yehuda Junction, near Hebron. It said first responders had provided medical treatment to at least five people, including two in critical condition.
The identities of the two people alleged to have launched the attack and who were killed by Israeli forces were not immediately clear as of late Friday morning.
The lockdown comes ahead of next week’s Israeli election, which is largely viewed as a referendum on Netanyahu’s leadership around the Hamas-led Oct. 7, 2023, attacks.
Netanyahu has focused much of his campaign in the lead-up to Tuesday’s vote on security for Israelis. His government has repeatedly warned of potential attacks by the country’s “enemies” in the lead-up to the election, without providing evidence.
In the wake of Friday’s attack, he noted that he had “warned several weeks ago about our enemies’ attempts to harm us, our civilians and our soldiers ahead of the elections. That is what they tried to here.”
Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz suggested there would be a sweeping offensive in Hebron, comparing it to Israel’s deadly assault in Gaza and its operations Lebanon, as well as in the Jenin refugee camp in the northern West Bank.
“Every clan neighborhood in Hebron from which the terrorists emerged today will be evacuated of its residents, and the terror infrastructure in the neighborhood will be addressed and dismantled,” he said. “This is the only language that jihadist terrorism understands. Just like in Gaza, just like in Lebanon.”
Itamar Ben-Gvir, Israel’s far-right national security minister, called Friday for the Palestinian Authority, the governing body that has long overseen parts of the occupied West Bank, to be dismantled in response to the attack.
“There cannot be a situation where, within Judea and Samaria, we have a state of terror,” he said in a post on X. Far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich shared similar sentiments, saying there was “no avoiding a comprehensive military campaign” in the West Bank to “dismantle the Palestinian authority, collect weapons, and eliminate terrorists — just as in Gaza and Lebanon.”
The West Bank has been a growing flashpoint for months, and the past week has seen another wave of settler violence and military activity in the territory as the Palestinian olive harvesting season has gotten underway.