Israeli police kill Palestinian Bedouin man during raid in Negev desert village

Israeli police shot and killed a Palestinian Bedouin man during an overnight raid in his village in the occupied Negev (Naqab) desert, according to media reports and a local official.

The shooting of 36-year-old Muhammed Hussein Tarabin threatened to worsen the already strained relations between the Israeli government and the country’s Bedouin minority.

Israeli police have been conducting a large-scale operation in the village of Tarabin for the past week in what they claim as a crackdown on local crime.

Talal Alkernawi, the mayor of the nearby town of Rahat, confirmed the man's death.

Israeli police justified the death, saying that they opened fire on a man who had "endangered" forces during an arrest raid.

The Israeli news site Haaretz cited relatives as saying Tarabin, whose family name shares the name of the village, was in his home.

In a video statement, Tarabin’s 11-year-old son, Hussein, said that men in uniform came to their house at night. He heard shots and saw his father’s body lying on the ground.

Israel’s far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, who oversees the police force, expressed support for the police. "Anyone who endangers our police officers and fighters must be neutralised," he posted on X.

Ben-Gvir visited the village last week, and was pelted with stones and was then hustled away by military forces amid tensions in Tarabin.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Sunday that the country would do everything to prevent the Negev desert in southern Israel from becoming the "wild south," despite Israel's track record of violence, forced expulsion and destruction in the area. He congratulated Ben-Gvir on leading the initiative and said he would visit the region in the coming days.

Israel’s more than 200,000 Bedouin are the poorest members of the country’s Arab minority, which also includes Christian and Muslim urban communities. Israel’s Arab population makes up roughly 20 percent of the country’s 10 million people. While they are citizens with the right to vote, they are frequently subjected to discrimination in all kinds of sectors, including housing and employment. 

The Bedouin sector has grappled with crime and poverty, and about one-third of its members live in villages that the Israeli government considers "illegal". Israel says it is trying to bring order to a lawless area, but Bedouin leaders accuse the government of neglect, trying to destroy their way of life or pushing to relocate them to less desirable areas.

Residents say police have made around two dozen arrests in the village of Tarabin over the past week. Nati Yefet, a spokesman for the regional council of unrecognised villages in the area, said most have been quickly released.

"They’re looking for people, crime-related things, but they didn’t find anything," Yefet said. He accused Ben-Gvir of intensifying the raids in the run-up to elections expected later this year.

Marwan Abu Frieh, of the Arab rights group Adalah, said Israel has stepped up house demolitions in recent years, leaving thousands of residents without shelter and worsening the plight of communities often denied basic services.