Palestinians bury West Bank teen killed by Israel
Women cry at the funeral of 18-year-old Palestinian Mahmoud Abu Saan who was shot and killed by Israeli forces in the occupied West Bank
Tulkarm – Hundreds of mourners gathered on Friday for the funeral of a Palestinian teenager killed by Israeli forces in the occupied West Bank earlier that day.
In a statement, the Palestinian health ministry said 18-year-old Mahmoud Abu Saan was “killed this morning by live bullets from the occupation (Israel) in Tulkarm”.
Abu Saan’s head was shrouded in the Palestinian flag as his body was paraded through the town’s streets ahead of the burial, according to an AFP photographer.
The Israeli army said that while forces were patrolling “suspects fired and hurled explosives and stones at the soldiers, who responded with live fire”.
“Hits were identified,” the statement added, specifying that no soldiers were hurt.
The official Palestinian news agency, Wafa, reported that Abu Saan was “shot in the head by the occupation soldiers at zero distance”.
Israel has occupied the West Bank since the 1967 Six-Day War and its forces regularly conduct armed incursions into areas of the territory which are nominally under the control of the Palestinian Authority.
Friday’s killing comes three days after a Palestinian gunman wounded six people at an Israeli settlement in the West Bank with gunfire before being shot dead.
Violence linked to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict has this year killed at least 206 Palestinians, 27 Israelis, one Ukrainian and one Italian, according to an AFP tally compiled from official sources on both sides.
They include, on the Palestinian side, combatants as well as civilians and, on the Israeli side, three members of the Arab minority.