Israeli forces killed four Palestinians in the occupied West Bank on Monday, the Palestinian health ministry reported, as deadly violence surges there since the start of the war between Israel and Hamas.

Three Palestinians were killed and a fourth injured by Israeli army fire in Tulkarem, in the northwest of the West Bank, a Palestinian territory occupied by Israel since 1967, the ministry said.

Witnesses in Tulkarem told AFP that the three men killed were armed and in a car when they were intercepted by undercover Israeli agents.

The agents “shot at them in a street in the north of the city and the three men died,” one of the witnesses said on condition of anonymity.

Earlier, the Palestinian health ministry said Israeli forces killed a young Palestinian man and seriously injured three others in the town of Halhul, in the south of the West Bank.

More than 150 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli soldiers or settlers in the West Bank since the start of the Israel-Hamas war on October 7, according to the ministry.

On Sunday, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken met Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas in a surprise visit to the West Bank where the pair discussed “the need to stop extremist violence against Palestinians,” the State Department said.