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in 2017
Qusay al-Amour was shot by soldiers during confrontations between Israeli forces
and Palestinian youths in the town of Tuqu, near the West Bank city of
Bethlehem, on 16 January.
An eyewitness told the Palestinian rights group Al-Haq that Qusay, who was
wearing a mask, was sitting on the ground. When he stood up, he was shot.
The moments after his shooting were recorded on video by journalist Hisham Abu
Shakra.
The video shows soldiers firing at a Palestinian who had attempted to come to the
aid of Qusay, lying motionless on the ground, before several soldiers run towards
and grab the injured youth.
“One of the soldiers placed his knee on Qusay’s throat, while trying to handcuff
him but failed to turn Qusay’s left hand behind his body,” according to Al-Haq.
The soldiers then took Qusay by his hands and feet, while his unsupported head
repeatedly hit the ground as they carried him to an army jeep at a distance of
dozens of meters away from where he was shot.
A doctor at Beit Jala hospital announced that Qusay was killed after being shot by
three bullets in the thigh, stomach and chest.
“Qusay did not pose an imminent threat to the lives of soldiers and as such was
unlawfully killed,” Al-Haq stated.
Murad Yousif Abu Ghazi, 17
Murad Yousif Abu Ghazi was shot by Israeli forces during confrontations in Arroub
refugee camp, in the southern West Bank, on 17 March.
Israeli soldiers fired live bullets at a group of teenagers who they alleged had
thrown molotov cocktails at the military tower outside the camp.
“According to a preliminary inspection by the coroner, carried out under the
observation of the public prosecutor, Murad was struck by a live bullet that
entered the bottom left side of his shoulder,” according to Defense for Children
International-Palestine.
‘The bullet directly hit his heart before exiting out of his chest. This resulted in
Murad’s death, likely within minutes of the injury, according to the coroner.”
Another youth, Saif Awlad Issa, 16, was injured by a live bullet to his chest but
survived.
“Military fixtures like checkpoints and watchtowers in the West Bank and the
heavily surveilled ‘buffer zone’ along the border of Gaza are sites of frequent
clashes, representing significant risks of death, injury, and arrest to children who
live or pass near them frequently,” Defense for Children International-Palestine
stated after Murad’s slaying.
Murad had lost his close friend and classmate, Omar Madi Jawabreh, the year
before when the 15-year-old was shot in the chest by Israeli soldiers.
“Omar’s martyrdom affected Murad deeply, it changed him,” Murad’s mother,
Zeina, told The Electronic Intifada. “He visited Omar’s grave every day and wore
his necklace. He kept Omar’s picture in his pocket and always visited his mother
and was like a son to her.”
Murad’s family originally hails from Beit Jibrin, a Palestinian town ethnically
cleansed by Zionist militias in 1948, located in what is today called Israel.
Arroub is one of the most frequently raided camps in the West Bank, according
to UNRWA, the United Nations agency for Palestine refugees.
The whole camp participated in Murad’s funeral, his friend Ahmad told The
Electronic Intifada.
“Men, women and children. Everyone here loved Murad. My head will always be
held high because he was my friend.”
Yousif Shaaban Abu Athra, 15
Yousif Abu Athra (via DCIP)
Yousif Abu Athra was killed by Israeli tank shelling when he and two adult friends
approached the fence along Gaza’s boundary with Israel late at night on 21
March.
An Israeli army spokesperson told media that the three were behaving in a
suspicious manner, as though they were attempting to plant an explosive device,
without giving further details.
The teen’s father told Defense for Children International-Palestine that “his son’s
body was riddled with shrapnel, including injuries to his head.”
The Palestine Red Crescent Society told the rights group that Yousif was already
dead by the time emergency medics reached him.
Muhammad Waheed Atallah al-Ekir, 25, was seriously injured with shrapnel
wounds in his chest and abdomen during the same incident.
The military frequently fires on Palestinians who enter the so-called buffer
zone along Gaza’s boundary with Israel.
The no-go area is understood to extend some 300 meters into Gaza’s eastern and
northern territory, but Palestinian human rights groups say that the zones can go
as deep as 1,500 meters.
Muhammad Khatab, 17 and Jassim Nakhla, 16
Muhamad Khattab (via DCIP)
Muhmmad Khattab was killed when Israeli forces fired on the car he was driving
near the Beit El settlement north of the West Bank city of Ramallah on 23 March.
Three other children were wounded and left comatose during the incident. One of
them, Jassim Nakhla, died of his wounds on 10 April, just two days after his 16th
birthday, according to Defense for Children International-Palestine.
An Israeli army spokesperson told media that the youths had thrown firebombs
towards a food stand near the settlement adjacent to Jalazone refugee camp,
where the boys were from.
A witness told the rights group that soldiers shot at Muhammad when he got out
of his stalled car in order to push it.
When the soldiers began shooting, “Muhammad jumped back into the car to try
to escape, but the car did not start, according to DCIP’s source. The witness said
Israeli soldiers then approached the car and opened fire on all four children …
while inside the car.”
Muhammad, shot twice in the torso, was declared dead upon arrival to a hospital.
Jassim Nakhla (via DCIP)
The director of the emergency department at the Palestine Medical Complex told
Defense for Children International-Palestine that Jassim “sustained live
ammunition injuries to his head, chest, right thigh and right foot.”
The shooting of the teens pierced the bubble in nearby Ramallah, the seat of the
Western-backed Palestinian Authority, according to The Electronic Intifada
contributor Jalal Abukhater.
“Angry protesters took to the streets of Ramallah after Muhammad’s death,
chanting and screaming, expecting someone to listen,” he wrote at the time.
“Various groups of youths went around the city and asked the bustling
restaurants and cafes of Ramallah to close in mourning.”
Defense for Children International-Palestine called for an investigation into the
fatal shooting.
But as Abukhater stated, the suffering of grieving families “is compounded by the
knowledge that justice will never be served as long as the Israeli occupation
continues to exist.”
Defense for Children International-Palestine told The Electronic Intifada that one
of the two surviving boys is now paralyzed in his lower body and uses a
wheelchair. He is receiving therapy at a hospital in Israel and learning how to live
with his injuries.
The other child cannot balance properly while standing and is unable to use his
left hand because of nerve damage due to his injuries. He goes to therapy
sessions at a rehabilitation center in Ramallah.
Ahmad Ghazal, 17
The killing of Ahmad Ghazal on 1 April by Israeli Border Police may amount to an
extrajudicial killing, according to Defense for Children International-Palestine.
Ahmad, from the northern West Bank, had stabbed and wounded two Jewish
men in Jerusalem’s Old City, causing them minor injuries. After fleeing into a
nearby building, he was pursued by Israeli forces who opened fire on the teen.
Video from the scene shows Border Police forces running down an alley in the Old
City, past a man with blood on the back of his shirt, before more than a dozen
gunshots are heard.
Another video appears to show several bullet holes in the walls where Ahmad was
killed.
“Israeli forces prevented ambulances and medical personnel from entering the
building for several hours, the witness said,” Defense for Children International-
Palestine added. “After this period, the witness saw Border Police drag the teen’s
body out of the building and place it in a black bag.”
Ahmad had posted a photo of himself standing in front of Jerusalem’s Dome of
the Rock shortly before he was killed:
اإلخبارية قدس شبكة
✔@qudsn
الشهيد أحمد غزال يأخذ صورة "سيلفي"مع قبة الصخرة قبل تنفيذه عملية الطعن في شارع الواد بالبلدة
القديمة ،عصر اليوم.
10:33 AM - Apr 1, 2017
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Fatima Hjeiji, 16
Fatima Taqatqa
Fatima Taqatqa, from the town of Beit Fajjar near the West Bank city of
Bethlehem, was shot by Israeli forces after she drove a car into a group of soldiers
at the Gush Etzionjunction near the settlement bloc of the same name on 15
March.
Israel alleges that Taqatqa was waging a car ramming attack when she was shot.
No Israelis were injured in the incident.
Fatima succumbed to her wounds more than two months later.
Security camera footage shows Taqatqa’s car driving at a high speed over a
median and crashing into a barricade, behind which the soldiers were standing.
More than a dozen Palestinians and three Israelis have been killed at the Gush
Etzion junction since October 2015, according to the Ma’an News Agency.
Raed Ahmad Radayda, 15
Nouf Infayat was shot and critically wounded after she allegedly stabbed and
lightly injured an Israeli soldier outside the Mevo Dotan settlement in the
northern West Bank on 1 June. She died of her injuries the following day.
Video from the scene shows Nouf lying on the ground and moaning in pain while
Israelis, at least one of them armed, stand around her, cursing her and calling for
her death.
Defense for Children International-Palestine stated that Nouf, from the village of
Yabad, was shot six times in the neck, hand and thigh.
“Local news outlets reported that Nouf was left bleeding on the pavement for
nearly an hour before an ambulance arrived,” the group added.
“We are deeply concerned by video footage from this incident that suggests a
significant delay in urgent medical care for the injured child,” Ayed Abu Eqtaish, a
director at Defense for Children International-Palestine, stated.
Israeli forces have failed to provide medical treatment or prevented Palestinian
medics from accessing seriously wounded persons in many such cases in which
soldiers have shot alleged or actual attackers.
Amnesty International has stated that failure to provide first aid to the wounded
“violates the prohibition on torture and other cruel, inhuman and degrading
punishment.”
Aws Muhammad Yousif Salameh, 16
Qutaiba Ziad Zahran was shot after carrying out a stabbing attack on an Israeli
soldier at the Zaatara military checkpoint in the northern West Bank on 19
August.
Soldiers continued to shoot at the boy after he fell to the ground.
An eyewitness told the Palestinian rights group Al-Haq that “I heard at least five
bullet sounds when [Qutaiba] was already down.”
The teen died immediately, according to Al-Haq.
Qutaiba’s father, who said that the boy was the youngest of eight children,
learned of his son’s slaying from Facebook and local media.
“I received no official communication from any entity of the Palestinian Authority
notifying me of my son’s killing,” Qutaiba’s father testified to Al-Haq. “The [Israeli
occupation forces] withheld my son’s body; I did not know where it was being
kept or when it would be handed over to me for burial in our hometown of Allar.”
The day after Qutaiba was killed, dozens of Israeli soldiers raided his family’s
home. They searched the house and interrogated Qutaiba’s parents and siblings.
Qutaiba’s 30-year-old brother Tareq was arrested.
The grieving family were not be able to bury Qutaiba until 9 September.
Al-Haq stated that “The aftermath of Qutaiba’s killing, including the raiding of the
family home, interrogation of family members, and the holding of Qutaiba’s body,
all fall within Israel’s broad policies and practices of harassment and collective
punishment.”
An earlier version of this story included mention of a baby who died months after
suffering excessive tear gas inhalation, as the Palestinian Authority health ministry
announced at the time. The child’s death has been omitted from this story after
Defense for Children International-Palestine informed The Electronic Intifada that
the group had thoroughly investigated the baby’s case and had found that tear
gas inhalation was not a primary factor in his death.
Posted by Thavam