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Israel Fires Stun Grenade In Schoolyard
HEBRON, West Bank, March 15 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - Seven Palestinian children were burned and injured Thursday when Israeli soldiers fired a stun grenade into a schoolyard in the divided West Bank city of Hebron, witnesses and medical officials said.
Medical officials said the children, aged 10 to 13, attending a school in the Israeli-controlled section of Hebron, screamed as they were carried out of the school into ambulances and taken to hospital after the grenade, which emits a loud noise and a shockwave but no shrapnel, exploded near them.
Residents said there were no serious clashes at the time, but that a few of the children may have been throwing stones at soldiers.
Israeli border guards, responsible for patrolling security in the area, had no immediate comment.
In a written statement, the Israeli army said, "The army sees the removal of children from the circle of violence as highly important, but with that, will continue to act against anyone trying to compromise the security of Israeli citizens."
Burned on his back and hands, news agencies quoted one child with tears rolling down his cheeks: "They suddenly threw the grenade while we were sitting there."
One mother yelled, "My son, my son," weeping as her child was carried out of the school.
In Hebron, witnesses said the army also razed several hectares (acres) of Palestinian-owned land and closed an office of the Palestinian Islamic endowments near the border between Israeli and Palestinian ruled areas, Palestinian security said.
Israeli bulldozers destroyed two Palestinian homes and a workshop in an Arab village north of Hebron on Tuesday, witnesses said.
A spokesman for Israel's civil administration in the West Bank said the action was taken because the structures were near an area where a Jewish settler had been killed and had been built "illegally."
Under a U.S.-brokered agreement in January 1997, Israel withdrew its troops from four-fifths of Hebron, a city of 120,000 Arabs. It retained control of 20% of the city, where 400 zealous settlers and around 40,000 Palestinians live.
Meanwhile, some 600 reservists from the Israeli army have been in jail since October for refusing to serve in the Palestinian territories, the Maariv daily reported Thursday.
They have been sentenced to varying jail terms for not answering call-ups to serve either in military bases or Jewish settlements in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, the paper said.
An Israeli army spokesman said: "These figures are not significant, as they are down on the corresponding period for the previous year and are not simply the result of absenteeism due to what is happening in the Palestinian territories."
He said that between October 1998 and March 1999 "900 army reservists did not answer call-ups."
Israel imposes mandatory military service of three years for men and 21 months for women. The men can also be called up as reservists for periods up to more than a month per year until the age of 49.
The ongoing Palestinian Intifada, or uprising, which began September 28th, has left 438 people dead, the vast majority of them Palestinians, although the figure also includes 13 Arab Israelis and 65 other Israelis.
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