Palestinian teenager killed by Israeli gunfire in West Bank's Qalqilya: Palestinian ministry

Israeli forces shot and killed a Palestinian teenager during an Israeli army raid in the occupied West Bank on Thursday, the Palestinian health ministry said. 

The ministry, which identified the person killed as 14-year-old Firas Sharhabeel Abu Samra, said clashes broke out overnight after Israeli troops carried out a violent incursion in the Palestinian city Qalqilya.

The teenager was critically wounded by live bullets in the head, and was then transferred to Qalqilya Governmental Hospital before doctors pronounced him dead, according to the official Palestinian news agency Wafa.

وزارة الصحة: شهيد قلقيلية هو الطفل فارس شرحبيل أبو سمرة (14 عامًا). pic.twitter.com/K6lqVcVDwD

— Ultra Palestine - الترا فلسطين (@palestineultra) July 26, 2023

Israeli forces reportedly fired live and rubber-coated metal bullets, stun grenade and tear gas at residents in the city's neighbourhood of Al-Naqqar.

Another Palestinian was reportedly injured during the same raid in Qalqilya, according to local reports.

Qalqilya is often targeted by Israeli forces, who have launched frequent raids on the city. In March this year, the Israeli army killed another teenager - 16-year-old Amir Mamoun Odeh - at a military checkpoint in the city's northern entrance.

Israeli-induced violence in the West Bank has worsened over the past 15 months amid intensified raids and settler violence, which have increased since an extreme right-wing coalition headed by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu came to power in December of last year.

Such raids have led to the killing of over 200 Palestinians since the start of the year, mostly in the West Bank, which has been illegally occupied by Israel since 1967 following the Six-Day War.

(Reuters)