Israeli troops killed two Palestinians early Tuesday it had named as suspects in the June murder of three Israeli teenagers in the West Bank, the army said.
"Overnight, Amer Abu Aisha and Marwan Qawame, murderers of Eyal, Gilad and Naftali -- were killed in exchange of fire with IDF forces," army spokesman Peter Lerner said on his Twitter account.
The June abduction of the three teenagers from a hitchhiking stop in the southern West Bank sparked a huge Israeli search operation in which more than 400 Palestinians were arrested and at least five killed.
It also sparked the revenge killing by Jewish extremists of a Palestinian teenager and led to a surge in tensions that helped trigger the 50-day war between Israel and Hamas in and around Gaza that ended on August 26.