The Qibya massacre, known in Israel as Operation Shoshana, and also known as the Qibya incident, was a reprisal operation that occurred in October 1953 when Israeli troops under Ariel Sharon attacked the village of Qibya in the West Bank. At least sixty-nine Palestinian Arab villagers, two-thirds of them women and children, were killed. Forty-five houses, a school, and a mosque were destroyed.