NABLUS, Israeli settlers Wednesday dawn assaulted a Palestinian elderly and torched his lorry at the junction of Deir Sharaf, west of Nablus, according to WAFA correspondent.

She reported the son of Burhan Jrab that a group of settlers intercepted his 72-year-old father from Attil town, north of Tulkarm, as the latter was driving his truck loaded with vegetables to the wholesale vegetable market in Nablus city, and brutally assaulted him, inflicting bruises and cuts in his face.

The assailants set fire to the truck, reducing it and the load to ashes.

Jrab was rushed to a hospital in Tulkarm for treatment.

This wave of settler attacks followed the killing of three settlers who were killed near the colonial settlement of Ariel close to Salfit city in the occupied West Bank.

On Tuesday, Israeli forces shot dead a Palestinian man after he allegedly stabbed three Israeli settlers to death and seriously wounded three more near the city.

The alleged assailant, identified as 18-year-old Mohammad Morad Sami Souf, from Haris town in the Salfit governorate, then fled the scene in a vehicle and caused a car crash, before he got out and was shot dead by Israeli troops.

The stabbing came amid a spike in Israeli violence against Palestinians in the occupied West Bank this year.

On Monday, Israeli forces shot dead 15-year-old Fulla Rasmi al-Masalma a day before her birthday.

Israeli forces and settlers have killed 139 Palestinians, including at least 30 children, in the West Bank this year, making it the deadliest on a monthly average for Palestinians since the UN began recording fatalities in 2005.

More than 700,000 Israelis live in over 200 colonial settlements and outposts, deemed illegal under international law, across the West Bank and East Jerusalem.

Source: Palestine News & Info Agency