An officer and three soldiers sustained light to moderate injures Wednesday night after being targeted by an explosive that was detonated at the entrance of Joseph's Tomb in the West Bank city of Nablus.

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According to the IDF, the troops were operating to secure the route for Jewish worshippers to the holy site – considered the burial place of the biblical patriarch Joseph.

Video: Footage featured on Palestinian media showed a large column of smoke billowing after the blast / Credit: Arab media

All four wounded were taken to the Rabin Medical Center in Petah Tikva, the military said.

Footage featured on Palestinian media showed a large column of smoke billowing after the blast. A local wing of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad terror group claimed responsibility for the attack and Hamas praised it as a "message to the extremist occupation government that you have no security on any inch of our land, and you have no choice but to leave."

Clashes often erupt in Nablus, which is officially under complete Palestinian Authority control, particularly near Joseph's Tomb where the Israeli military regularly enters to accompany Jewish worshippers.

Dana Ben-Shimon, Hanan Greenwood and Yaron Doron contributed to this report. 

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One person was seriously injured overnight Tuesday in a major explosion at a military industries complex in Ramat Hasharon, central Israel. Two more were injured lightly.

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Rescue teams rushed to the scene to put out the fire that broke out after the blast.

Video: Dashcam footage of the explosion / Free usage under Israeli copyright law (Section 27A)

The Fire Rescue Services said in a statement that "numerous firefighting teams arrived at the scene from the [nearby] Herzliya stations to join the security personnel of the factory." They located "several centers of combustion" and gained control of the flames "without the use of hazardous materials."

It also said that the cause of the explosion was being investigated.

The overnight Tuesday explosion was the third to occur in the area in the past two and a half months alone, with the latest having happened in late July. At the time, Herzliya Mayor Moshe Fadlon warned that unless the government stepped up efforts to ensure safety, another explosion – with numerous casualties – was a matter of time.

"The government offices are deflecting blame. We are talking about a ticking bomb," he said. "Unless you take care of this, you should prepare for an event with thousands of injured."

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Israeli policies risk triggering an "explosion of violence" in the West Bank, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said Thursday in a telephone conversation with Russian President Vladimir Putin, Palestinian media reported.

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The Palestinian leader told his Russian counterpart that Israeli settlements, home demolitions and "settler terrorism" were among factors building up anger and resentment among Palestinians in the West Bank, the Wafa news agency said.

"The continuation of these Israeli measures will lead to an explosion of the situation," Wafa said Abbas told Putin.

Russia is a member of the Middle East Quartet of international mediators, along with the United Nations, the United States and European Union.

Abbas spoke with Putin two days after meeting with Defense Minister Benny Gantz at his home.

It was the first official visit to Israel by Abbas since 2010. Months earlier, Gantz had visited Abbas in Ramallah, the seat of the Palestinian Authority.

i24NEWS contributed to this report. 

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A gas condensate pipeline at a gas refinery in southwestern Iran exploded on Thursday after being hit by an excavator, but there were no casualties and the line was shut off, Iranian news agencies reported.

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Twelve individuals were injured, but "there were no casualties and rescue and operations forces are at the scene of the accident and have cut off the line," state broadcaster IRIB quoted the Parsian refinery's head as saying.

The semi-official Fars news agency carried a similar report.

Mohammad Asgari, a spokesman for the National Iranian Gas Company, said gas production was not affected by the accident, the semi-official YJC news agency reported.

Iran has the world's second largest natural gas reserves but production has not kept pace with galloping demand for heavily subsidized gas, partly because of lack of investment and foreign partners as the economy faces US sanctions.

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Judge Tarek Bitar, who is investigating the deadly 2020 Beirut port explosion asked security forces on Friday to implement an arrest warrant he issued two months ago for former Finance Minister Ali Hassan Khalil charged over the blast. 

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Bitar asked security forces, via the public prosecutor's office, to implement the warrant against Khalil, else they themselves be prosecuted for defying judicial orders, a senior judicial source told Reuters.

A number of current and former senior politicians and security officials have been charged in connection with the blast that killed more than 215 people, but have refused to be interrogated by Bitar, saying he lacks the authority to do so and is biased.

His probe has repeatedly been stalled by lawsuits filed by suspects seeking his removal. It resumed this week after being suspended for more than a month.

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An investigation into last year's Beirut blast is set to resume after a court rejected the last of several lawsuits that had led the probe to be suspended for more than a month.

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The investigation into the blast, one of the biggest non-nuclear explosions ever recorded, has faced pushback from a political system where impunity has become entrenched since the end of the 1975-1990 civil war.

Here's what you need to know about the standoff:

What is the judge investigating?

The explosion that was caused by chemicals left at the port for more than six years and which killed more than 215 people, injured thousands and devastated swathes of Beirut.

Judge Tarek Bitar, 47, wants to interrogate several senior politicians and security officials.

High-level security and government officials "foresaw the significant threat to life ... and tacitly accepted the risk of deaths occurring," Human Rights Watch has said.

Bitar's efforts have become a rallying cry for many Lebanese against decades of unchecked corruption and mismanagement.

Whom does the judge want to question?

Some very powerful people.

The most prominent include former finance minister Ali Hassan Khalil, who is the right-hand-man of Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri and an ally of the Iran-backed Hezbollah, and Major General Abbas Ibrahim, head of Lebanon's General Security.

The judge has also sought to question Hassan Diab, an academic who was prime minister at the time of the blast.

Many of them could face prison time if convicted of negligence or causing deaths, although Lebanon has almost no track record of holding to account people in top positions.

All deny wrongdoing.

How are Bitar's efforts being stymied?

All of the current and former officials Bitar has sought to question as suspects have resisted, arguing they have immunity or that he lacks authority to prosecute them.

This resistance to his actions has played out in the courts, in political life and on the streets.

Suspects have swamped courts with more than two dozen legal cases seeking Bitar's removal over alleged bias and "grave mistakes," leading to several suspensions of the probe.

The ex-ministers say any cases against them should be heard by a special court for presidents and ministers.

That court has never held a single official accountable, and it would pass control of the probe to ruling parties in parliament, likely burying hopes of accountability.

Sectarian sensitivities have been brought into play.

The move against Diab, for example, prompted objections from Sunni Muslim political and religious leaders who said it was an attempt to target the position of prime minister, which is reserved for a Sunni in Lebanon's sectarian political system.

Why does Hezbollah care?

Bitar has not charged any known members of Hezbollah, the Shiite Muslim group that has powerful political influence and a heavily armed militia. But the judge's actions, including his attempts to question powerful figures allied to Hezbollah as suspects, have prompted the group to accuse him of bias.

In September, a senior Hezbollah official sent him a message warning that the group would "uproot" him.

Hezbollah and its allies have pushed for Bitar's removal via the executive branch, sparking a row that has paralyzed government.

Together with its allies, Hezbollah called for an anti-Bitar protest in October that escalated into deadly violence.

Hezbollah has accused the United States, which lists the group as a terrorist organization, of meddling in the probe. The US ambassador has denied this.

Hezbollah dismissed accusations made at the time of the blast that it had an arms warehouse at the port and says it had nothing to do with the explosion. Its adversaries have long accused the group of controlling the port – something it also denies.

What's at stake?

Any hope of accountability.

For advocates of reform, the tussle over the probe is part of a wider struggle about the rule of law and bringing to account officials for corruption and bad governance responsible for other catastrophes too, including Lebanon's financial meltdown.

Critics say the elite are using their influence to block any attempt to set a precedent of holding officials to account and want to bury any scrutiny of the port's management, which is a microcosm of the sectarian system which parcels out public resources to serve the interests of major players, not the state.

Beirut's already strained ties with Western governments, whose help could prove vital in lifting Lebanon out of its economic crisis, may suffer further if the probe is torpedoed.

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An explosion was reported Wednesday on a central gas pipeline in southwestern Iran.

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The Tasnim news agency reported that tremors from the blast were felt throughout the surrounding area and said that the explosion had occurred because the infrastructure was old.

Video: Social media

"This accident did not lead to any casualties," a local official from the oil-rich province of Khuzestan told state media, adding that the fire had been put out.

However, the Saudi news outlet Al Arabyia, which operates form the United Arab Emirates, quoted local officials saying they suspected that the explosion had been set off deliberately.

Pictures posted on social media showed flames at the site of the blast.

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An explosion occurred at an Iranian power plant in the port city of Bandar Abbas in southern Iran that led to a massive fire, local media reported Saturday.

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According to sources, a substation of the city's major power plant went up in flames, causing a power outage in more than a quarter of the city. Smoke from the fire engulfed large parts of Bandar Abbas, but no casualties were reported.

Spokesperson for the local electrical company said the incident was caused by a nearby brushfire and was not the result of malicious intent.

In the past, Iran's electrical infrastructure – which is already outdated – was targeted by activists who oppose the regime. Southern Iran, in particular, has been the center stage of activity by rebel groups from the Ahvaz and Balochistan districts.

Last year, Bandar Abbas was hit by a major cyberattack that paralyzed its port and other facilities. Foreign media outlets reported at the time that the attack was carried out by Israel in retaliation for a serious Iranian attempt to interfere with the Jewish state's water infrastructure system.

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The leader of the Christian Lebanese Forces party on Thursday refuted claims by rival Shiite Hezbollah of seeking to start a civil war.

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In an interview with Lebanese broadcaster MTV, Samir Geagea said the confrontation with Hezbollah was purely political and must remain so.

The Lebanese Forces is a registered political party with official members, he said, contrary to Hezbollah which "legally does not exist as it is not registered with the Interior Ministry and its members are accused of various crimes."

"We do not have fighters," Geagea said.

Nobody should think about confronting Hezbollah militarily, Geagea added, saying that doing so would be a big mistake.

Already suffering a devastating economic meltdown, Lebanon has been overshadowed by renewed tensions since seven Shiite Muslims were shot dead in Beirut last week during the worst street violence in the capital in more than a decade.

The heavily armed, Iran-backed Hezbollah accused the Lebanese Forces of perpetrating the killing and attempting to instigate a civil war.

"The real agenda of the Lebanese Forces is civil war," Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah said in a televised speech, adding that his Iran-backed terrorist organization would not be dragged into one.

Thursday's shooting started as supporters of the Shiite group and ally Amal were gathering for a demonstration against Tarek Bitar, the lead investigator in the Beirut port blast probe.

Geagea said that while he initially thought Hezbollah had nothing to do with the explosion, "with its recent actions it is telling us that perhaps it might be concerned" over the matter.

Hezbollah has been leading demands for Bitar to be removed, accusing him of bias. The lead investigator has sought to question several Hezbollah allies on suspicion of negligence that led to the blast, which killed more than 200 people and devastated swathes of Beirut.

In its efforts to stop the probe, Hezbollah has taken the current government "hostage," Geagea said, referring to how the standoff over Bitar has paralyzed the cabinet.

Geagea also told reporters that he had been summoned for questioning over the shooting.

"I am ready to appear before the judge, on one condition: that Hassan Nasrallah does it before me," he said.

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Satellite image provider ImageSat International reported Thursday that it had located the source of an explosion reported earlier this week at an Iranian facility operated by the Revolutionary Guards Corps.

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Israel opted not to respond to reports about the blast, which occurred on Sunday at a research center west of Tehran. The explosion caused a fire that injured three people who were at the site, two of whom died of their injuries after being evacuated to the hospital.

On Sunday, Iranian state TV quoted an IRGC confirmation that "On Sunday evening a fire broke out in one of the IRGC … research centers in the west of Tehran. Three people were injured and the fire has been contained."

The original Iranian reports did not address the blast, the fire, or detail the extent of the damage caused. On Monday, the IRGC released the names of the two casualties in the incident.

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