On Saturday morning, seven Israeli soldiers suffocated inside a fortified military tower at the main entrance of Beit Ummar town, north of Hebron, in the southern part of the occupied West Bank, after Palestinian protesters burnt the tires in front of its gate.
Media sources said Israeli ambulances rushed to the tower and moved the wounded soldiers to an Israeli hospital.
The Israeli army closed the area to the Palestinians before Israeli firefighters also rushed to the scene of the incident and extinguished the fire.
Local activist Mohammad Ayyad Awad said the soldiers were apparently sleeping and did not notice the fire until the intense smoke from burnt car tires started raising.
Awad added that, on Friday night, the soldiers closed the town’s main entrance after protests near it, especially when a protester hurled a Molotov cocktail at it.
