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Israeli fire kills Palestinian in Gaza stone-throwing clash: Health Ministry

12:00 Jun 9 2017 east of Jabalia and Bureij refugee camps in Gaza

Israeli fire kills Palestinian in Gaza stone-throwing clash: Health Ministry
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House in the Jabalia refugee camp, destroyed by Israeli bombing 2012. Source: Wikipedia
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Reuters:

Israeli soldiers opened fire at Palestinians who were throwing stones near the border fence in the Gaza Strip on Friday, killing one man and wounding four others, the Palestinian Health Ministry said.

The Islamic Jihad Palestinian militant group said the man killed was a member of their armed wing.

An Israeli military spokeswoman said hundreds of Palestinians had gathered along the fence and were throwing stones and burning tyres.

Soldiers on the Israeli side of the border opened fire after their calls to the Palestinians and warning shots were ignored, she said.

Israel and the Islamist Hamas movement which rules Gaza have fought three wars since 2008, though the border has been largely quiet in recent months.

On Friday, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, the main U.N. aid agency in Gaza, said it had discovered part of a tunnel running under two of its schools in a refugee camp in the enclave.

UNRWA said it had protested over the finding to Hamas, which in a 2014 war had used a network of cross-border tunnels to launch attacks inside Israel.

"UNRWA condemns the existence of such tunnels in the strongest possible terms. It is unacceptable that students and staff are placed at risk in such a way," a written statement said.

Hamas spokesman Fawzi Barhoum denied the tunnel belonged to his or any other Gaza militant group.

Israel pulled out of Gaza in 2005. The Palestinians want to establish an independent state in the enclave, the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem, territories that Israel captured in the 1967 Middle East war.

U.S.-brokered peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians collapsed in 2014.

At least 249 Palestinians and one Jordanian citizen have been killed since a wave of sporadic violence began in 2015 in Israel and the Palestinian Territories.

Israel says at least 167 of those killed were carrying out stabbings, shootings or car-ramming attacks. Others died during clashes and protests.

Thirty-seven Israelis, two American tourists and a British student have been killed in the violence, which has slowed in recent months but not stopped.

(Reporting by Nidal al-Mughrabi and Maayan Lubell; Editing by Hugh Lawson)
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BETHLEHEM (Ma’an) -- Israeli forces shot dead a Palestinian and injured at least six others in the besieged Gaza Strip on Friday after clashes broke out near the border between northern Gaza and Israel, while Israeli forces also injured two more Palestinians with live ammunition during clashes in central Gaza.

Clashes broke out between Israeli forces and Palestinians to the east of Jabaliya refugee camp in the northern Gaza Strip, when Israeli forces killed Aed Khamis Jumaa, 35, after shooting him in the head with live ammunition, according to the Palestinian Ministry of Health.

Six other Palestinians were also injured with live ammunition fired by Israeli forces and were rushed to Gaza's Indonesian hospital to receive medical care, the ministry added.

In a separate incident, Israeli forces injured at least two Palestinians with live ammunition -- one in his arm and the other in his foot -- after clashes broke out east of Bureij refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip, according to witnesses.

An Israeli army spokesperson told Ma’an "several violent riots" took place in the border area between Israel and Gaza when "hundreds of Palestinians" attempted to damage Israel's separation fence, burned tires, and hurled rocks at Israeli forces. She said that Israeli forces are still stationed in the area to "prevent damage to the fence."

The spokesperson added that she was aware of a Palestinian being killed and others being injured and confirmed to Ma'an that Israeli forces had used live ammunition on the protesters, which she said was part of Israel's protocols when Palestinians enter the "buffer zone" -- a unilaterally declared and undefined area between Gaza and Israel's separation fence.

Clashes have regularly erupted on Gaza’s border with Israel, as tens of Palestinians continue to demonstrate in protest of Israel’s decade-long siege on the small Palestinian territory.

On Tuesday evening, Israeli forces shot and killed a Palestinian protester and injured at least seven others with live fire in the Gaza Strip during clashes.

After Israeli forces shot and critically injured a Palestinian teenager in the stomach with a live bullet during a protest in Gaza two weeks ago, rights group Defense for Children International - Palestine (DCIP) denounced the Israeli army’s excessive use of live fire on Palestinians in the besieged coastal enclave.

“Israeli forces’ frequent use of live ammunition at the Gaza border shows a pattern of disregard for Palestinian lives,” DCIP Accountability Program Director Ayed Abu Eqtaish said, and deplored the fact that accountability for injuries and fatalities in such cases “is extremely rare.”

According to Ma’an documentation, Jumaa became the fourth Palestinian to be killed in little over a week and the 30th Palestinian to be killed by Israeli forces or settlers since the beginning of the year, many of whom were shot during clashes with Israeli forces in the occupied Palestinian territory.

On Monday night, a Palestinian citizen of Israel was shot dead by an Israeli security guard during clashes in the Palestinian-majority town of Kafr Qasim in central Israel.

In 2016, seven Palestinians were killed by Israeli forces in the Gaza Strip, when 18 Palestinians were shot and killed by Israeli forces during clashes across the occupied Palestinian territory -- out of more than 100 Palestinians to be killed by Israelis over the course of the year.

Israeli police and soldiers have come under heavy criticism over the past year for what rights groups have referred to as “extrajudicial executions” and excessive use of force against Palestinians -- especially youth and children -- who did not pose an immediate threat or who could have been disarmed through non-lethal means, particularly during clashes.


Features
Aed Khamis Jumaa, 35, shot to death by Israeli forces 6/9/2017
Israeli forces injured at least two Palestinians with live ammunition 6/9/2017
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