OCCUPIED JERUSALEM — A 23-year-old Palestinian, Mohammed Edwan, was shot dead by Israeli forces on Tuesday during clashes with troops in the occupied West Bank, Palestinian health officials said.
The Israeli military said troops opened fire after Palestinians threw rocks and explosives at them during an operation southeast of the city of Ramallah.
The Palestinian health ministry said the man had lived in Qalandiyah refugee camp near East Jerusalem and that three other Palestinians were wounded.
Tensions have been high in the West Bank since a Palestinian kill
ed an Israeli soldier and a rabbi in a stabbing and shooting attack in mid-March.
Israel captured the West Bank in the 1967 Middle East war. Palestinians seek to establish a state there and in the Gaza Strip, with East Jerusalem as its capital. Israeli-Palestinian peace talks collapsed in 2014.
The Israeli army said there was a "riot" during an operation in the nearby Kufr Aqab area, and "rocks and explosive devices were hurled at the troops, who responded with fire".
"A report was received regarding an injured Palestinian. The incident will be examined," the army statement said.
Qufr Aqab is located on the other side of the Israeli separation barrier which divides occupied Jerusalem from the occupied West Bank, but is still considered part of the city.
Israeli forces often enter Palestinian towns in the West Bank to carry out arrests in raids that frequently lead to clashes, sometime deadly.
An eye witness in the Qalandiyah camp said that Edwan did not pose a danger to any of the soldiers and that they shot him in cold blood for no reason.
Meanwhile, the Israeli army arrested a senior Hamas official, Sheikh Hassan Yousef, during a wave of arrests in the West Bank overnight Monday, according to Palestinian reports.
The IDF spokesperson said that Israeli security forces, including the IDF, Shin Bet, Border police and Israel police, arrested 12 people suspected of involvement in terror activities, nationalistic terror and violent disturbances. — Agencies
