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Welcome to Palestine Today, a service of the International Middle East Media Center, www.imemc.org, for Thursday January 3rd, 2013.

Israeli soldiers attack Jenin city in the west Bank and injuries three residents, while report shows that Israeli’s government approved more settlements in 2012 than previous years. These stories, and more, coming up, stay tuned.

Local sources in Jenin, in the northern part of the occupied West Bank, reported that several Palestinians have been injured by Israeli military fire, on Thursday morning, during clashes that took place after the army invaded the city and surrounded a building apparently in an attempt to assassinate a Palestinian fighter.

Medical sources reported that at least ten Palestinians were moved to a local hospital suffering mild injuries, while another Palestinian suffered moderate injuries as dozens of youths hurled stones and empty bottles at the invading soldiers. Dozens of Israeli soldiers driving armored jeeps surrounded a residential building before breaking into it and searching several homes.

Initial reports indicated that the army assassinated a fighter of the Al-Quds Brigades, the armed wing of the Islamic Jihad, but it became clear later on that the fighter managed to escape from the building before the army even reached it. The soldiers sealed the entire area and prevented the residents from entering or leaving it.

Earlier on Thursday, the army invaded Beit Ummar town, north of the southern West Bank city of Hebron, and kidnapped two residents identified as Nizar Ali Awad, 18, and Rafat Mustafa Awad, 15. It is worth mentioning that Nizar was shot and injured, a few days ago, by a live round fired by an Israeli soldier, and was kidnapped today while still recovering from his injury.

Also on Thursday, several armored Israeli military vehicles and military bulldozers invaded central Gaza and bulldozed large areas of Palestinian lands. Local sources reported that the army also fired rounds of live ammunition during the invasion, while military helicopter flew overhead.

And that’s all for today from the IMEMC News; this was the Thursday January 3rd, news round-up from the Occupied Palestinian Territories. For more news and updates please visit our website at www.imemc.org. Today’s report has been brought to you by Hussam Qassis and me, Ghassan Bannoura.

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