The Israeli army and Palestinian health authorities said that an Israeli airstrike on a vehicle in the occupied West Bank resulted in the deaths of five Palestinians, as violence erupted in the occupied territories.

The Israeli army claimed that its forces struck a vehicle carrying five militants in a rural area northwest of Tulkarm city in the northern West Bank early Saturday morning while the passengers were on their way to carry out an attack. The health ministry later confirmed the deaths of five men in the strike and that they were transferred to the nearby Tulkarm hospital.

According to a journalist from the Associated Press and eyewitnesses, the explosion occurred along a road connecting the Palestinian villages of Zita and Qaffin.

Taysir Abdullah, a resident of Zita, said, "I was going to work in the morning and heard an explosion here next to the house."

The official Palestinian news agency "Wafa" reported that four bodies "were burned and charred to the point that they could not be identified" due to the explosion.

More than 590 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli fire in the West Bank since the outbreak of the war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza in October, according to the Palestinian health ministry tracking fatalities. Most were killed during Israeli raids and violent protests, but the deceased also include bystanders and Palestinians killed in attacks carried out by Jewish settlers.

The northern West Bank has witnessed some of the worst violence in the region over the past ten months. Tulkarm and its refugee camps have become one of the main flashpoints in the area, regularly subject to raids by Israeli forces. Armed Palestinian groups, including Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad, are active in the city.

The strike came a few days after the assassination of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran early Wednesday morning, and the assassination of Hezbollah's top commander, Fouad Shukr, in Beirut the previous evening, escalations that threaten to plunge the region into a full-scale regional war. Iran and its proxies, including Hezbollah, have vowed to respond. Major airlines canceled flights to Tel Aviv, Israel, and Beirut, Lebanon.

While Israel claimed responsibility for Shukr's death, it neither confirmed nor denied its role in the targeted assassination of Haniyeh.

The Pentagon announced late Friday that the U.S. military will transfer a squadron of fighter jets to the Middle East and maintain an aircraft carrier in the region. The day before, President Joe Biden said he urged Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to seize the opportunity for a ceasefire with Hamas, adding that Haniyeh's death in Iran "did not help" efforts to negotiate an end to the war.

At least 39,480 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza in nearly 10 months since Hamas launched its attack on Israel on October 7, igniting the recent war between Israel and Hamas. The Palestinian health authorities that report casualty numbers do not differentiate between civilians and fighters.