Cluster Missile Kills Three Women in West Bank Salon
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- Iranian missile struck a beauty salon in Beit Awwa, near Hebron, on Wednesday night, killing three Palestinian women and injuring eight others.
- The Israeli military said the women were killed by a direct hit from a cluster munition missile, marking the first Palestinians killed in the West Bank as a result of the Iran war.
- The victims — Mais Ghazi Masalmeh, 17, Sahira Rizq Masalmeh, 50, and Amal Sobhi Abdel Karim Matawa' Masalmeh, 36 — had been waiting for nail appointments ahead of the Eid al-Fitr holiday.
- The Palestinian Red Crescent Society initially reported four women killed before revising the toll to three, and said crews faced "significant difficulties" reaching the site because iron gates to the area were closed.
- Thai worker Chaiwat Weaw-nil, 30, was also killed by shrapnel in Moshav Adanim, about 12 miles (20km) northeast of Tel Aviv, the same night.
- Iran has repeatedly fired missiles with cluster-bomb warheads at Israel — munitions that release large numbers of bomblets mid-flight, scattering them over a wide area.
Why it matters: These are the first Palestinian deaths in the West Bank directly tied to the Iran war, extending the conflict's blast radius far from Israel's main air defense perimeter. The nail-salon setting and the gate-delayed medics show how cluster munitions scatter harm into routine civilian life, while a Thai farmworker dying 20km from Tel Aviv the same night underlines the indiscriminate reach of these warheads.
