Eyewitness report: Funeral of 17 year old student attacked by same Israeli soldiers who killed him

The Israeli military has been slowly escalating its intimidation tactics in Beit Ommar over the last three days, often patrolling the streets at sundown, provoking youth by parking outside of the mosque and waiting for young boys to come and throw stones before shooting tear gas and rubber-coated steel bullets.

The increasing terrorization of the village culminated at approximately 9:30 pm Friday when a 17 year old boy, Mohammed Anwar Al-Alami, was shot in the heart and killed.

Soldiers first entered the southern West Bank’s town at 4 pm and began slowly circling the village, often stopping in the center of town, shooting a few tear gas canisters, but otherwise staying in their jeeps. They were not searching houses nor made any other indication that they were engaging in any authorized operation. Shortly after sundown, at approximately 9 pm, they began arresting residents: blindfolding and handcuffing nine men in total and bringing them to the entrance of the village. Four were later released, five remain in Israeli custody. Several more jeeps and Armored Personnel Carriers (APC's) entered the village. Young boys began throwing stones and empty bottles which bounced off the armored military vehicles harmlessly. Still, for the Israeli military a rock against reinforced metal is reason enough to end the life of a young man, about to finish his final exams and graduate from high school.

Mohammed was quickly rushed to the hospital, but he had been shot in the chest and the bullet entered his heart, killing him almost instantly.

When international activists approached the soldiers one was thrown to the ground and his camera was stolen from him. Another observer with the Christian Peacemaker Teams, who was on crutches, was also knocked to the ground by the commander of the Israeli forces. The video tape and memory cards of the cameras of the CPT activists were all taken, erasing evidence of the assault on them presumably in an attempt to cover-up the egregiously excessive violence used by the Israeli army against young people.

On Saturday at 10:30 am international and Palestinian activists with CPT and Palestine Solidarity Project joined the community as they took the body from the hospital in Hebron and drove in the funeral procession back to Beit Ommar. The long line of cars with Palestinian and political faction flags hanging out the windows was soon accompanied by two Israeli military jeeps. Not given a moment to grieve, the Israeli military soon brought in reinforcements and gathered a mass of jeeps and soldiers near the cemetery. uruknet