On Saturday July 2nd Israeli forces shot 17-year-old Kamel Alawneh in the northern occupied West Bank district of Jenin. He succumbed to his wounds a day later.
Alawneh was was shot in the abdomen and arm, and was pronounced dead on Sunday afternoon, making him the 78th Palestinian killed by Israeli forces this year, and the 16th Palestinian child killed by Israel since the start of 2022.
Kamal was scheduled to take his final high school exams this month, with one scheduled for today.
Israeli military jeeps raided the town of Jaba south of Jenin, sparking protests and confrontations with Palestinians in the area, during which Israeli forces were reported to have fired live ammunition as well as teargas, plastic coated steel bullets, and stun grenades into residential areas.
Haaretz reported that an Israeli military spokesperson accused Alawneh of throwing a Molotov cocktail at the soldiers, though no Israelis were injured in the alleged incident, and no evidence was provided to back up the claims.
According to Dr. Tawfiq Shobaki, the head of the surgery department at the Ibn Sina hospital in Jenin where Alawneh was treated, the teen was injured with two bullets, the first to his abdomen and a second to his right elbow.
Dr. Shobaki also confirmed to Mondoweiss that the bullet shots were fired directly at Alawneh, exiting from his back.
Alawneh was reportedly named after his older brother of the same name, who was killed by the Israeli army in 2003, during the Second Intifada.
Israeli raids on Jenin
Since the start of the year, Israeli forces have killed 28 Palestinians in the district of Jenin alone, including Al Jazeera veteran reporter Shireen Abu Akleh, who was killed while covering an Israeli raid on the Jenin refugee camp.
Just last week, Israeli forces killed 23-year-old Muhammad Maher Marei from Jenin refugee camp.
Of the 16 children killed by Israel in 2022, seven were killed in the Jenin district.
Israeli military raids are common practice in the occupied West Bank, and take place on a near nightly basis. Under Israeli military law in the West Bank, soldiers do not require a judicial warrant justifying the need to invade and intrude on private Palestinian spaces, including peoples’ homes.
According to UN documentation,Israeli invasions happen more than 200 times per month exposing children and adults alike to army abuses and denial of right to protection, shelter, and refuge under international law.
The Israeli military regularly raids areas that fall under ‘Area A’ of the territory, which is under the full control of the Palestinian Authority, under the highly criticized policy of security coordination between the two.
Jenin continues to be the center of confrontation and resistance against Israel’s military occupation and its control of Palestinian lives, access to resources, and basic rights and freedoms.
Killing of Palestinian children
The targeted killing of Palestinian children and teenagers poses additional concerns to Israel’s breach of international law, and the continued disrespect to human lives and futures.
Following the killing of a 16-year-old Palestinian boy in Ramallah on June 25th, Ayed Abu Eqtaish, accountability program director at Defense for Children International Palestine (DCIP) said“Israeli soldiers know no bounds and kill Palestinian children with impunity.”
“Palestinian children will continue to be targeted. They will continue to be unlawfully killed without actual justice and accountability,” he said.
Israeli forces have killed two thousand one hundred and fourteen (2,114) Palestinian children and minors since 2000. That is an average of ninety-six (96) children and minors killed per year. No accountability measures are taken in order to impede and obstruct the common targeting of Palestinians by armed soldiers- often under the pretext of throwing stones or participating in protests as per the right to assembly and right to resist occupying powers enshrined under international law.
Another striking trend shows that since 2019, the annual number of criminal investigations against Israeli soldiers suspected of harming Palestinians has been on the decline, according to Israeli human rights group Yesh Din.
Palestinian children killed by Israel at the time of this article
Source: Defense for Children International – Palestine
- Mohammad Akram Abu-Salah- 17
- Mohammad Rezeq Salah- 17
- Yamen Jaffal- 16
- Nader Rayyan- 17
- Sand Abu Attiyeh- 17
- Mohammad Sakarnah- 17
- Qusay Hamamrah- 14
- Showkat Kamal Abed- 17
- Mutasem Atallah Al-Zeer- 17
- Thaer Al-Yazoori- 17
- Amjad Al-Fayed- 17
- Ghaith Rafeeq Yamen- 16
- Zaid Said Ghanaym- 15
- Odeh Mohammad Odeh- 17
- Mohammad Abdallah Salah Suleiman- 16
- Kamel Alawnah- 17
For the killers, Palestinian lives, especially children, are of no consequence. Palestinian lives are cheap, the children are all future “terrorists”, and why not kill as many as you like because the world, and certainly the US, will conveniently ignore yet another Israeli crime. How many lives taken away by brutal Israeli killers? How many Palestinian mothers and fathers have to shed tears, and eventually get no justice for the loss of their child? How many more Palestinians will be killed by the Apartheid nation without reason? You can safely bet there will be plenty more before the year ends, and beyond.
According to the apologists Arab parents don’t love their children like the Jewish parents love their little darlings. The precious Jewish lives that grow up to join the IDF, kill unarmed civilians, march through Arab streets shouting anti Muslim slogans, and calling for the deaths of Arabs. Then you also get the Jewish darlings in the illegal settlements that the US State Department calls “terrorists”, who throw stones, spit on Arabs, steal their crops, and even attack homes while Palestinians are sleeping, killing a family, including a baby, when they set fire to the home. Despite these facts we are supposed to believe that it the Palestinians who are violent, and that is how the US Government and the media responds to these situations, and runs with that narrative.
If Israel wants the stones, and the home made rockets and devices stopped, the solution is simple – end the occupation, stop stealing lands, and give these long suffering people their long overdue freedom and basic rights.
Ugly reality:
https://scheerpost.com/2021/05/14/chris-hedges-israel-the-big-lie/
“Israel is not exercising ‘the right to defend itself’ in the occupied Palestinian territories. It is carrying out mass murder, aided and abetted by the U.S.”
https://www.commondreams.org/news/2021/05/03/national-lawyers-guild-urges-biden-align-us-israel-palestine-policy-international
“National Lawyers Guild Urges Biden to Align US Israel-Palestine Policy With International Law” Common Dreams, May 3/21, by Brett Wilkins. “The United States cannot turn its back on the atrocities, including war crimes, enabled by U.S. policies, particularly its decades long policy of shielding Israel from accountability.”
List of Israel’s violations of international law:
http://itisapartheid.org/Documents_pdf_etc/IsraelViolationsInternationalLaw.pdf
It’s Time to End the ‘Special Relationship’ With Israel (foreignpolicy.com)
“It’s Time to End the ‘Special Relationship’ With Israel”“The benefits of U.S. support no longer outweigh the costs.”By Stephen M. Walt, the Robert and Renée Belfer professor of international relations at Harvard University, May 27/21.
https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/.premium-education-minister-to-speak-at-confab-honoring-rabbi-who-praised-hebron-massacre-1.7619653
EXCERPT:
“Education Minister to Speak at Confab Honoring Rabbi Who Praised Hebron Massacre” Haaretz, August 9/19 by Shira Kadari-Ovadia.
“Rafi Peretz and Bezalel Smotrich will be guests of honor as Rabbi Yitzchak Ginsburgh, seen by many as a spiritual figure for violent settler extremists, receives prize.”
“Education Minister Rabbi Rafi Peretz and Transportation Minister Bezalel Smotrich are set to give speeches at a conference which will also honor a rabbi who praised the 1994 Hebron massacre and was previously charged with inciting racism.
“The ministers, who are both running in the United Right political alliance in the September election, will speak at a Thursday event during which a prize will be awarded to Rabbi Yitzchak Ginsburgh.
“The U.S.-born rabbi is known for publishing a pamphlet praising the actions of religious extremist Baruch Goldstein, who in 1994 carried out the massacre in the Tomb of the Patriachs, in which he killed 29 Muslims at prayer. Ginsburgh is also among the rabbis who endorsed the book ‘The King’s Torah,’ which discusses circumstances in which Jews may kill non-Jews according to Jewish law.”
I looked up a couple of names and both came up as having been killed during combat with Israeli soldiers. This bellyaching about innocent dead children is kind of hard to take seriously until there is a breakdown of how many of these 16 and 17 year olds were actively involved in firefights with Israeli soldiers. If the Palestinians insist on recruiting teenagers to be terrorists then they will get killed as terrorists.