A leading Israeli rights organisation has said that it had requested a military investigation into a senior commander over suspected war crimes in the occupied West Bank, AFP reports.

The request comes days after Major General Avi Bluth, head of the Israeli military in the West Bank, appeared in a video in which he called for curfews and encirclements of Palestinian villages.

In a letter to the military advocate-general, the Association for Civil Rights in Israel (ACRI) urged an inquiry into Bluth, citing comments and actions it said amounted to collective punishment of Palestinians.

“We ask you to order the opening of an investigation against Major General Bluth on suspicion of war crimes,” ACRI wrote in the letter, which was dated Sunday.

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