JERUSALEM, April  13, 2024 (BSS/AFP) - Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on
Saturday condemned the "heinous murder" of an Israeli teenager in the occupied
West Bank as attacks on Palestinian villages intensified following news of his
death.

After Benjamin Achimeir, 14, was reported missing near Ramallah on Friday,
hundreds of Jewish settlers backed by Israeli forces raided nearby Palestinian
villages, torching cars and homes, and left at least one villager dead and
dozens wounded.

The attacks escalated in several villages on Saturday after Achimeir's body
was found near the Malachi Hashalom outpost. AFP correspondents saw smoke
rising from burnt houses and fields.

The mayor of nearby Al-Mughayyir village, Amin Abu Alyah, told AFP: "Dozens
of settlers are now attacking the village and burning everything they find in
front of them. They burned a house, a bulldozer and a number of vehicles."

Palestinian prime minister Mohammed Mustafa condemned the attacks and urged
the authorities to help the people of Al-Mughayyir.

Netanyahu said Israeli forces were "in an intensive pursuit after the
heinous murderers and all those who collaborated with them".

"The heinous murder of the boy Binyamin Achimair is a serious crime," he
said.

Israel's Defence Minister Yoav Gallant warned "revenge" attacks would make
it difficult for security forces to find the perpetrators. "The law must not be
taken into one's own hands," he wrote on social media.

Israeli opposition leader Yair Lapid said "violent riots of the settlers
are a dangerous violation of the law and interfere with the security forces."
Hundreds of thousands of Israelis live in West Bank settlements considered
illegal under international law.

With tensions already high in the face of the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza,
Israeli security forces and hundreds of volunteers formed a huge search party
to look for Achimeir on Friday.

Jewish settlers who were part of the manhunt raided Al-Mughayyir, firing
shots and torching homes and cars in the village while residents responded by
throwing stones, AFP journalists reported.

At least one person was killed and 25 wounded, the Palestinian health
ministry said on Friday.

Overnight, the official Palestinian news agency Wafa reported that five
Palestinians were wounded in another settler attack in Abu Falah village near
Ramallah.

On Saturday Suleiman Dawabsha, mayor of Duma near Nablus, told AFP the West
Bank had been "in a real state of war since yesterday".

He said Israeli troops and settlers had set fire to more than 15 houses and
10 farms in his village.

The West Bank, which Israel has occupied since 1967, has seen a surge in
violence since early last year, which has intensified since the Israel-Hamas
war erupted on October 7.

At least 462 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli troops or settlers in
the West Bank, according to Palestinian official figures.

Francesca Albanese, the United Nations special rapporteur on the rights
situation in the Palestinian territories, urged the UN to "authorise the
deployment of a protective presence in the occupied Palestinian territory, with
the explicit mandate to prevent and (repel) attacks against civilians".

"The Israeli army has abundantly proven unwilling or unable to ensure that
task," she wrote on X.