A member of the Palestinian Authority’s security forces died on Sunday in clashes with Palestinian gunmen in the Jenin refugee camp in the occupied West Bank.

For the past two weeks, fighting has erupted in Jenin, in the northern part of the West Bank, between members of Palestinian armed organizations and the security forces of the Palestinian Authority, which exercises limited authority in the area.

“Zaher Farooq Jumaa Erhail was killed (s.a. yesterday) in the morning while performing his national duty,” according to an announcement by the security forces.

Clashes erupted when a group of members of the Palestinian Authority’s security forces came under fire from “outlaws” in the Jenin refugee camp, the statement continued, clarifying that two other members were wounded.

Heavy gunfire and explosions were heard in the camp yesterday, an AFP photojournalist found.

Usually rare, clashes between armed groups and Palestinian Authority security forces have multiplied this month.

Already 3 Palestinians, among them a teenager, had been killed during it.

Earlier this month, the arrest of gunmen in the Jenin area by Palestinian security forces appears to have ignited the gunpowder.

Jenin and the refugee camp on its borders are a stronghold of Palestinian armed organizations, which claim to be more effective in the fight against Israel than the Palestinian Authority.

The latter partially exercises administrative authority in the West Bank, a Palestinian area under Israeli occupation since 1967.

The clashes add to the further escalation of violence in the West Bank following the outbreak of war in the Gaza Strip on October 7, 2023.