The 3-year-old Muhammad Haitham Al-Tamimi died, Monday, of serious injuries sustained Thursday by Israeli army bullets at the entrance to the village of Nabi Saleh, in the northern occupied West Bank.
The Israeli Sheba Hospital confirmed the death of the 3-year-old Muhammad Haitham al-Tamimi, while the Palestinian Ministry of Health said that it had been informed by the Israeli side of “the child’s death.”
The ministry pointed out that there are arrangements to transfer his body to Ramallah on Monday, before his funeral.
On Thursday, the Israeli army announced that one of its military sites near the settlement of “Neve Tzuf” in the West Bank had been subjected to gunfire, before the soldiers stationed at the site responded to the source of the fire.
According to the army, “as a result of the live fire fired by the army…two Palestinians were injured”, including a 3-year-old boy who was transferred by helicopter to an Israeli hospital, and his father.
The Israeli army expressed its “regret for harming non-combatants,” noting that the incident was “under study.”
Agence France-Presse met the father, who was transferred to a Palestinian hospital near the city of Ramallah in the occupied West Bank.
Father Haitham Al-Tamimi said, “I was with my son in the car, going to visit some relatives… Suddenly, my son and I were injured.”
The 40-year-old father, who was wounded in the right shoulder, believes that the shooting “was from the Israeli military watchtower”.
The Palestinian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Expatriates called for an urgent international investigation into the child’s murder.
On Monday, the Palestinian News Agency (Wafa) reported that dozens of Palestinian youths were injured after confronting groups of settlers who stormed the village of Burqa in the northern West Bank. Wafa added that the Israeli army arrested 22 Palestinians today during various raids in the West Bank.
About 490,000 Israelis live in the West Bank, occupied by Israel since 1967, in settlements that are illegal under international law.
Since the beginning of January, at least 156 Palestinians, 21 Israelis, a Ukrainian and an Italian have been killed in confrontations, military operations and attacks, according to an AFP tally based on official Israeli and Palestinian sources.
