A Netanyahu government may raise the temperature in a boiling West Bank

Israelis went to the polls on November 1st, a team of Israeli soldiers carried out an unusual raid in the old city of . By day its casbah is a lively place, famed for its sweets. But in the pre-dawn hours of October 25th it was a war zone. Five Palestinians were killed and dozens injured. Another Palestinian was killed in a different episode that evening.The target was a new armed Palestinian group called the Lions’ Den. It has claimed responsibility for a string of attacks on Israeli soldiers in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, which Palestinians see as the future core of an independent state. Israeli police say they also foiled a planned attack by the Lions in Tel Aviv in September. The raid, which followed weeks of restrictions on Nablus residents, felt reminiscent of the Palestinians’ bloody , or uprising, two decades ago. In recent years Israeli soldiers had rarely entered the old city, let alone fired off shoulder-fired missiles in the middle of town.