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Scene. Published by Maan News
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BETHLEHEM (Ma’an) -- Israeli forces shot and injured a Palestinian in the southern occupied West Bank city of Hebron on Thursday morning after he allegedly attempted to stab a border police officer, Israeli police said.

Israeli police spokeswoman Luba al-Samri said in a statement that a Palestinian resident of Hebron in his twenties approached the border police officers stationed at a military checkpoint near the Ibrahimi Mosque while carrying a knife and shouting insults, before Israeli forces shot him. Al-Samri added that no Israelis were injured in the alleged attack.

She said that the Palestinian was injured and had been transferred to Hadassah hospital in Jerusalem for treatment, while remaining under police custody as part of an investigation into the incident.

A spokesperson for Hadassah told Ma'an that the Palestinian had arrived to the hospital shortly before 10 a.m. and was in light to moderate condition after having been shot in the waist. She added that the Palestinian youth was in a stable condition and conscious.

Al-Samri also stated that a toy gun and a toy bomb were found in the Palestinian's possession, later adding that the border police officer who had shot the Palestinian had been interrogated as part of the investigation.

Locals told Ma'an that Israeli forces closed the entrance to the nearby Salayma neighborhood with an iron gate following the shooting.

Israeli forces have detained scores of Palestinians for allegedly being in possession of knives in the past year following a spate of alleged and actual small-scale knife attacks by Palestinians that surged in the fall of 2015. Hebron in particular grew as the epicenter of upheaval, with a number of Palestinians having been shot at military checkpoints in the area.

Rights groups have disputed Israel's version of events in a number of cases, also denouncing what they have termed as a "shoot-to-kill" policy against Palestinians who did not constitute a threat at the time of their death, or who could have been subdued in a non-lethal manner -- amid a backdrop of impunity for Israeli forces who have killed Palestinians.

Eyewitnesses have also said in a number of cases that Israeli security forces planted knives on slain Palestinians to claim that they were acting in self-defense.