NABLUS, West Bank — Nablus was a battered city. Shops gaped open to the street, their windows smashed. Street signs were overturned. Ash stained the roads. Armored vehicles roamed the city center, still pockmarked and splattered with paint from a day of protests.
The destruction resembled the aftermath of firefights between Palestinian youths and the Israeli military in the occupied West Bank’s second-largest city, where posters of killed Palestinians paper the old city’s limestone walls. But this time, Israel was not involved. The violent chaos on Tuesday that left a 53-year-old man dead erupted between Palestinians and their own security forces, who coordinate with Israel in an uneasy alliance against Islamic militants.
The rare outburst, coming amid the deadliest violence in the West Bank since 2016, underscored the internal divisions tearing at Palestinian society and cast a spotlight on the growing ranks of disillusioned, impoverished young men taking up arms.
Many have spent their entire lives in a territory occupied by Israel, scarred by infighting and segmented by checkpoints. They have not known a national election since 2006. They have no hope in the long-stalemated peace process. Their aging president, Mahmoud Abbas, is in his 18th year of what was supposed to be a four-year term. They see his Palestinian Authority as a vehicle for corruption and collaboration with Israel.
The clashes erupted after Palestinian forces arrested two men, including Musab Ishtayyeh, a popular local militant wanted by Israel. A 26-year-old man who lives in the area said that although the sides reached a truce, further violence was likely unless Ishtayyeh is released.
“I do not recognize the presidency of Abu Mazen,” he said, voicing a popular sentiment in the neighborhood. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he feared arrest.
“There is no difference between Israel and the Palestinian Authority,” he added, saying the Palestinian security forces “want to burn the resistance and kill those who fight.”
The latest violence stems from a series of deadly Palestinian attacks inside Israel last spring, which triggered a surge in nightly Israeli arrest raids across the territory. Some 90 Palestinians have been killed in the crackdown. Israel says many were militants or local youths who hurled stones and firebombs at troops, though several civilians have also died.
Experts say the escalation has deeper roots in a power struggle, as Palestinian leaders vie…
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