At least five killed in Israeli attack on Occupied West Bank city

Palestinian authorities said five people were killed in Israeli strikes in the West Bank city of Jenin as people and emergency services attended the aftermath on Friday.

The Israeli military said it was conducting counterterrorism activity that included an airstrike in Jenin.

The military said Israeli soldiers had “encircled a building where terrorists have barricaded themselves in” and the soldiers were exchanging fire, while an airstrike had “struck several armed terrorists” in the area.

No further details were immediately available from either side.

The Popular Resistance Committees, a grouping of armed groups in Gaza issued a statement mourning the five men, and vowed revenge.

It called the attack 'a cowardly assassination'.

The clashes in Jenin, a known stronghold of resistance fighters, came a day after an Israeli anti-settlement monitoring group said the government plans to build nearly 5,300 new homes in settlements in the occupied West Bank.

The construction plans revealed by the Peace Now group are part of the hard-line government’s efforts to beef up settlements as part of a strategy of cementing Israel’s control over the West Bank to prevent a future Palestinian state.

Violence has spiraled in the West Bank since the start of Israel’s war on Gaza.

The war has so far killed more than 38,000 Palestinians, Gaza’s Health Ministry says.