Palestinian killed as Israeli soldiers fire on vehicle in West Bank

Israeli forces opened fire on a vehicle in the occupied West Bank on Tuesday, killing one Palestinian and wounding another, Israel's army and the Palestinian health ministry said.

An army statement said a vehicle approached Israeli soldiers in a suspicious manner near the illegal settlement of Halamish and the Palestinian village of Nabi Saleh.

"The soldiers perceived the vehicle as a threat and consequently fired towards it in order to stop it," it said.

Israel's military also said no soldiers were wounded and "the event is being reviewed".

The Palestinian health ministry said one man died, identifying him as 26-year-old Mohammed Mussa.

A health ministry spokesman told AFP the man was travelling with his sister when they were shot.

The sister was shot in the shoulder and is receiving treatment, with her injuries not life-threatening, the spokesman added.

Mussa was left bleeding on the asphalt before Palestinian paramedics arrived at the scene, video from the incident shared on social media showed.

A wave of unrest that erupted in October 2015 has claimed the lives of at least 303 Palestinians and Palestinian citizens of Israel, 51 Israelis, two Americans, two Jordanians, an Eritrean, a Sudanese and a Briton, according to an AFP toll.

Israeli authorities say most of the Palestinians killed were carrying out knife, gun or car-ramming attacks.

Others were shot dead in protests and clashes, while some were killed in Israeli air strikes on the Gaza Strip.

Gazan tunnel blown up

Separately on Monday, Israel's military blew up a tunnel it said stretched from the Gaza Strip into Israel that it said could be used for attacks, killing seven Palestinians.

Paltoday, a website that supports Islamic Jihad, said the tunnel belonged to that group's armed wing.

"The occupation government should learn that we will not fail to protect our people and land," said Daoud Shihab, a spokesman for Islamic Jihad.

"We affirm our right to respond to the aggression of the occupation today."

Israel's prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, said Hamas was ultimately responsible regardless.

"We see Hamas as being responsible for any attempt emanating from its territory, and carried out by people who are under its authority, to impinge on our sovereignty," Netanyahu said.

Hamas said Israel had made a "futile attempt to sabotage efforts to repair Palestinian unity", a reference to the reconciliation agreement it reached with Mahmoud Abbas, the president of the Palestinian Authority, earlier this month.

Hamas is due to hand control of the Gaza Strip back to the Palestinian Authority by 1 December under the agreement.