A young Palestinian man has been killed and six more were injured during an Israeli military raid on a refugee camp in the central West Bank, in the latest confrontation that has made 2022 the deadliest year of violence in the occupied territory in nearly a decade.
Faraan: Palestinian officials said the raid began with several Israeli military vehicles entering Dheisheh refugee camp, located just south of Bethlehem, early on Monday morning. Local sources said Israeli snipers were positioned on the rooftops of houses and buildings overlooking the camp, before clashes broke out between residents and troops. Israeli forces then fired dozens of live rounds, rubber-coated steel bullets, tear gas canisters and stun grenades to disperse the crowd.
The Palestinian health ministry identified the 22-year-old victim as Omar Yousef Manna’ Fararja, saying he was killed after being shot in the chest. The ministry added that six other Palestinians were wounded by Israeli forces’ live fire. Palestinian medical staff rushed them to Bethlehem hospitals for treatment. Israeli troops also ransacked many homes in the refugee camp, and abducted three Palestinians, including Omar’s 24-year-old brother, Yazan.
The development comes a few days after the fatal shooting of a young Palestinian man by Israeli forces in the northern part of the West Bank. Video footage widely circulated on social media showed an Israeli soldier holding the Palestinian man, identified as 22-year-old Ammar Mefleh, in a headlock by a road in the town of Huwara, south of Nablus, on Friday as two other men try to wrestle him away.
The man then appears to strike the Israeli soldier, before the trooper pulls out a handgun and shoots him several times at point-blank as he falls to the ground. A senior UN official and the European Union’s foreign policy chief call for a probe into the killing of a Palestinian youth in the occupied West Bank city of Nablus.
Israeli forces present at the scene prevented residents and ambulances from providing aid to the injured Palestinian youth, provoking clashes with locals.
