NABLUS,
West Bank, March 27 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) - A
seven-year-old Palestinian boy was shot dead while playing in front of
his house during an Israeli raid in a West Bank city Saturday, March
27, with the Palestinians accusing the Israeli army of shooting the
innocent boy in cold blood.
An
Israeli local commander, however, strongly denied his troops killed
the boy during their raid of the northern West Bank city of Nablus,
according to Agence France-Presse (AFP).
Khaled
Walaweel was playing in the courtyard of his house. He showed no
hostile intentions towards the Israeli occupation forces in any
manner. However, an Israeli soldier shot him in the back from the roof
of a building troops have reoccupied earlier in the day, eye-witnesses
told IslamOnline.net.
Palestinian
security sources and an eye-witness from the pro-Palestinian
International Solidarity Movement verified the same version of events,
according to AFP.
“I
was 50 meters (yards) from the jeep when the soldiers opened fire
without any provocation," ISM photographer Omar Tibi said,
according to AFP.
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Stone
throwing is met by bullets in the occupied territories (AFP)
|
Medical
sources at Nablus Hospital said to IOL that the boy was already dead
when he arrived the hospital, pointing out that “an Israeli bullet
hit him in the back, making an exit through his chest”.
On
the other hand, an Israeli commander for the sector, Lieutenant
Colonel Hazut Gai insisted there had been no live fire from his troops
and that the boy's death must have been the result of a stray bullet
from a Palestinian resistance fighter.
“The
boy's death happened right at the end of the operation," the
colonel was quoted by AFP as saying.
“A
Palestinian emerged from an alleyway and fired a very inaccurate burst
of fire towards us before fleeing.
“A
few minutes later we heard screams from a house behind us which had
apparently been hit and we saw a man carrying his son.
“We
offered to take him to an Israeli hospital but he refused."
Both
sides agreed that the unrest broke out after two companies of Israeli
occupation troops raided the camp pretending to be conducting a search
for what Israel terms “wanted militants”, a reference to
Palestinian resistance fighters and were met by stone throwing youths.
On
Sunday, March 7, another 7-year-old boy
was killed in cold blood by an Israeli bullet in the neck during a
raid in Gaza Strip.
Mahmoud
Abdullah Younis, from Nuseirat refugee camp in the Gaza Strip, was
among the first of a tally of 15 Palestinians killed by Israel's
bloodiest raid in the Strip in 17 months.
