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Three Palestinians were arrested under suspicion of involvement in a shooting attack aimed at soldiers in the West Bank last week, the Israeli army said on Sunday.

The suspects were captured in the Palestinian village of Thinaba, for their alleged involvement in a shooting attack at Israeli soldiers, which wounded one lightly on Wednesday, east of Tulkarem, in the northern West Bank. The assailants managed to flee the scene.

The three were arrested in a joint operation by the Israeli military and Shin Bet security agency on Friday and confessed to plotting and carrying out the attack and surrendered the weapons used for the attack, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) spokesperson said in a statement.

Among the Palestinians captured is a member of the Palestinian Authority intelligence service, Alaa Barqawi, who is believed to have hid the gun used by the two other suspects for the attack.

On Sunday morning, Israeli security forces raided the home of a senior Hamas official and Palestinian parliament member Hatem Qafisha, and arrested him and at least five other Palestinians on suspicion of "involvement in terror activity," a military spokesperson said.

In a related matter, the Shin Bet released a statement regarding the interrogation of 15-year-old Palestinian from Beit Amra near Hebron, who is suspected of killing Dafna Meir in the settlement of Otniel on January 17.

Twenty four Israelis and one U.S. citizen were killed in stabbing, shooting and car-ramming attacks by Palestinians in the past three months. More than 150 Palestinians have died, some in clashes with Israeli security forces during protests, while more than half died after allegedly carrying out, or attempting to carry out, attacks against Israelis, as they were shot dead by security forces and vigilante citizens at the scene.

Israeli leaders blame the Palestinian Authority for incitement to violence behind the wave of attacks, fueled by strife over the site of the al-Aqsa mosque (or Temple Mount) in east Jerusalem, holy to Jews and Muslims.

The Palestinians, on their part, charge Israel's occupation of the West Bank, east Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip, ongoing since 1967, and the dim prospects of establishing a Palestinian state in these territories in accordance with the two-state solution, are to blame for the upsurge in violence.

Source: XINHUA