Five Palestinian militants have been killed in an Israeli army raid near Jericho in the occupied West Bank.
The armed wing of the Islamist movement Hamas said all those killed were its members.
It is the latest in some nightly operations by the Israeli military targeting militants in the territory.
The last two weeks have been a particularly bloody period, with deadly Israeli raids and Palestinian attacks on Israelis.
The Israel Defense Forces said Sunday night’s operation aimed to arrest a Hamas terrorist cell which it said was behind a gun attack a week earlier on a restaurant near a Jewish settlement close to Jericho, but no one was injured in that attack.
Palestinian towns and villages there are mostly governed by the Palestinian Authority, which is dominated by Hamas’ secular rival, Fatah.
The raid, coupled with activity by a Hamas cell, is unusual in Jericho, which has a relatively high concentration of Fatah-loyal PA security forces.
Witnesses say there was heavy gunfire during the incident in Jericho’s large Aqabat Jabr refugee camp. Bullet holes and bloodstains could be seen in a small house at the centre of the fighting.
