Palestinians: Settlers torched mosque near Nablus

Damage to mosque, inside a school building in Howarra village, includes broken windows, blackened walls, burnt carpets; police investigating.

Border police Nablus mosque 311 R (photo credit: Reuters)
Border police Nablus mosque 311 R
(photo credit: Reuters)
Palestinians in the West Bank accused settlers of torching a mosque at a village school near the city of Nablus on Tuesday.
The damage to the mosque, inside a school building in Howarra village, included broken windows, blackened walls and burnt carpets.
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Nablus Governor Jibreen al Bakri accused settlers of causing the blaze "This is part of a series of aggressions by settlers in the area. We have warned in the past and we warn again that settlers want to drag the area into a cycle of violence," he said.
A police spokesman said the incident was being investigated.
In contrast to previous cases where vandals had left graffiti in Hebrew on the walls of damaged mosques, in this case police said that initially they had not found any similar signs. A number of vandal attacks on mosques in the same area last year were blamed on settlers.
Last month, a Palestinian policeman shot dead an Israeli and wounded four other Jewish worshippers after they entered a holy site in Nablus without permission.