Question

I’m wondering what is the best way in python to search & delete an XML tag, content inside it(whatever it is doesn’t matter) as well as its closing tag? XML is well formed as well.

Answer 1

You could identify the element with XPath and then use the remove method:

import xml.etree.ElementTree as ET
data = '''\
<node1>
  <node2 a1="x1"> ... </node2>
  <node2 a1="x2"> ... </node2>
  <node2 a1="x1"> ... </node2>
</node1>
'''
doc = ET.fromstring(data)
e = doc.find('node2/[@a1="x2"]')
doc.remove(e)
print(ET.tostring(doc))
# <node1>
#   <node2 a1="x1"> ... </node2>
#   <node2 a1="x1"> ... </node2>
# </node1>