Suspected Israeli settlers set fire to mosque in West Bank

Suspected extremist Israeli settlers have set fire to a mosque and sprayed graffiti on its walls in the occupied West Bank.

A resident of the West Bank village of Jaba said that “somebody entered the mosque, broke the window and threw a match causing a fire” during the early hours of Tuesday.

The assailants wrote on the walls in Hebrew, “The war has begun” and “Pay the price,” the resident said.

“Neighbors saw the fire, ran to the mosque and put it out.”

Meanwhile, an Israeli police spokesperson said extremist settlers may be responsible for the assault.

“At the moment different directions are being looked into as well as the possibility that it was caused as a result of one of these price tag incidents. That is one of the main directions that we will be looking into,” the spokesman said.

In recent years, extremist Israeli settlers in the occupied West Bank have often assaulted Palestinians and vandalized their property under the so-called “price tag” policy. However, the Tel Aviv regime rarely detains the assailants.

On June 11, Israeli settlers damaged several Palestinian cars in East al-Quds (Jerusalem).

The extremists say the “price tag” attacks are carried out against any Israeli policy ‘to reduce the presence of settlers and settlements on occupied Palestinian land in the West Bank and East al-Quds.’

More than half a million Israelis live in over 120 illegal settlements built since the 1967 Zionist Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territories of the West Bank and East al-Quds (Jerusalem).