Ramallah, July 25 (Petra) – Israeli occupation forces on Saturday arrested 80 Palestinians, including ex-prisoners, in escalating raids across the West Bank, the Palestinian Prisoners Club said.

The search-and-arrest campaign came a day after a massacre by troops and settlers in Tell village, near Nablus in the north of the West Bank, where dozens were detained and interrogated, part of a policy of collective punishment in the occupied territory, said the Prisoners Club, an NGO advocating for Palestinians held in Israeli jails.

It said most of the recent arrests were in response to Palestinians standing up against Jewish settlers assaulting their towns, farms and property to force families to leave their homes.

These crimes are an extension of the occupation authority's decades-long policies targeting the Palestinian presence and imposing repression and control, said the group.

As Israeli troops tightened restrictions on movement across the Northern West Bank, a one-month-old baby girl narrowly escaped death after Jewish settlers attacked her family's home in Urif village, south of Nablus, and set it on fire.

The Palestinian Red Crescent Society said settlers broke into the house and set it ablaze while the baby was asleep in her crib, and paramedics managed to rescue her from the flames and smoke.

//Petra//SS