A Palestinian protester holds a stone during clashes with Israeli security forces following an anti-Israeli protest after the weekly Friday prayers on Sept. 18 Hebron.

A 21-year-old Palestinian died during an Israeli army operation in the southern West Bank before dawn on Tuesday in circumstances that were unclear.

Palestinian security officials named him as Dia al-Talahmeh and said he was shot dead by Israeli troops.

An Israeli army spokeswoman said he had been killed by a makeshift bomb he had been preparing to throw at the patrol but did not say whether or not the troops had opened fire.

The spokeswoman said the patrol had been deployed to clear stones blocking a road outside the flashpoint city of Hebron.

“The soldiers heard an explosion and during a search of the sector they found the body of a Palestinian killed by the explosive device he intended to throw at one of our vehicles,” she said.

Separately on Tuesday morning, Israeli troops shot and wounded a Palestinian woman at a checkpoint near the centre of Hebron, witnesses said. The Israeli military said she had attempted to stab a soldier.

“An attack was thwarted when a Palestinian attempted to stab an (Israeli) soldier at a military position in Hebron,” an army statement said.

“(Israeli) forces responded, fired towards the perpetrator and identified a hit.”

Tensions have been running high across the West Bank, including Israeli-annexed East Jerusalem, ahead of the Jewish Yom Kippur holiday which begins at sundown on Tuesday.

The Muslim Eid al-Adha holiday begins on Wednesday evening and continues until Sunday.

Israel has deployed thousands of extra police in east Jerusalem and closed it off from the rest of the West Bank.