MEE Staff
Middle East Eye / August 4, 2023
Mahmoud Abu Saan, 18, was shot dead by Israeli forces at point blank range, according to eyewitnesses.
Israeli forces killed an 18-year-old Palestinian man during a military raid in a refugee camp in the occupied West Bank on Friday morning.
The official Palestinian news agency, WAFA, reported that the dead teenager was Mahmoud Abu Saan, killed at the Nour Shams refugee camp, east of Tulkarm.
Quoting Palestinian eyewitnesses, WAFA, said that Saan was shot at point blank range to the head at close range and was later pronounced dead at the hospital.
Following the Israeli raid a local wing of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad group opened fire on Israeli forces detonating several explosive devices.
Human rights organizations have described night raids as one of the methods used by the Israeli army to terrorize Palestinians and hammer home the idea that even their safest spaces are not off-limits for Israeli soldiers.
The raids can last for hours and sometimes turn deadly.
According to testimonies taken by rights organizations, night raids leave permanent scars on Palestinian families, traumatizing children in particular, who, as a result, suffer from anxiety and sleep disorders and struggle at school.
At least 202 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli fire this year, including 34 children – a rate of nearly one fatality per day.
A total of 165 people have died in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, making 2023 one of the bloodiest years in the occupied Palestinian territories. Another 36 people were killed in the Gaza Strip.
Meanwhile, Palestinians have killed 25 Israelis in the same period, including six children.
