AN ISRAELI hit squad “assassinated” three Palestinians in a West Bank hospital today.

Three shooters, disguised as medical workers and civilian women, carried out their deadly raid inside the wards of the Ibn Sina hospital in the town of Jenin, killing the men while they were sleeping.

The Health Ministry in Ramallah said: “This morning three young men were martyred by the bullets of the occupation forces who stormed the Ibn Sina hospital in Jenin and shot them.”

The official Palestinian news agency Wafa named the three men as Muhammad Jalamnah, Muhammad Ayman Ghazawi and Basel Ayman Ghazawi.

A statement from Israel said they had “neutralised” the men, who were hiding in the hospital and who were part of a Hamas “terrorist cell.”

The statement added: “A gun was found on a wanted person, which was confiscated by the forces.”

Hospital director Naji Nazzal said: “A group of Israeli forces entered the facility undercover and assassinated the men,” using weapons “fitted with silencers.”

A statement from Hamas said one of the men was one of its members, another was with the Jenin Battalion and the third was also a Palestinian resistance fighter.

They said that the Israeli army’s “crimes will not go unanswered.” 

Hamas says it’s in the process of reviewing a truce plan put forward by senior Qatari, Egyptian, Israeli and US officials during meetings in France.

Politburo chief Ismail Haniyeh said that Hamas wants a deal based on stopping Israel’s war on Gaza and a “complete withdrawal of occupation forces from the Strip.”

But Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu denied today reports of a possible ceasefire deal to end the war in Gaza, repeating his vow to keep fighting until “absolute victory” over Hamas.

He said: “We will not withdraw the Israeli military from the Gaza Strip and we will not release thousands of terrorists,” referring to Hamas’s main demands.

The war began after the surprise Hamas attack on October 7, during which 1,200 people died, and 250 others were abducted. 

Over 100 were released during a week-long ceasefire in November in exchange for Palestinians imprisoned by Israel.

In response, Israel launched a relentless air, sea and ground offensive that has killed more than 26,700 people, about two-thirds women and children, according to the Gaza Health Ministry.

The conflict has also displaced 85 per cent of the population and pushed a quarter of Gazans to starvation.