HAWARA, West Bank (AP) — A makeshift sidewalk memorial with a Palestinian flag and obituary notice on Saturday paid tribute to a 22-year-old Palestinian whose death at the hands of an Israeli border police officer — four pistol shots at close range — was captured on widely shared amateur video.
A day after the shooting in the occupied West Bank city of Hawara, Palestinians fought back Israeli police claims that Ammar Adili had been shot dead in self-defense after he attacked Israelis, including a border guard, and resisted arrest.
They said the officer killed Adili without justification and that Israeli security forces prevented Palestinian medics from rescuing the seriously wounded man, who lay on the sidewalk of a busy thoroughfare.
The 38-second video begins with a scuffle between the border guard and three Palestinians, including Adili, on the sidewalk as traffic rushes by. The officer pulls Adili away in a chokehold and they exchange punches after Adili breaks free. He tries to get the officer’s assault rifle, which falls to the ground behind the officer, out of Adili’s immediate reach. The officer then draws his pistol and fires four shots while an unarmed Adili falls to the ground.
Immediately after Friday’s deadly shooting, police claimed Adili tried to attack two Israelis in a car with a knife and then tried to break into the locked vehicle with a rock. The driver was said to have shot and wounded Adili, who then attacked a group of border police and stabbed one in the face, police said. The border police officer tried to detain Adili, who resisted and tried to take the officer’s gun, police said. The officer who shot him was not injured.
Hawara Mayor Moein Dmeidy and others on Saturday cited second-hand reports that Adili had an altercation with an Israeli motorist after a car crash, but Associated Press journalists could not find any witnesses to the events leading to led to the shooting.
Dmeidy said the officer had no justification for killing Adili after he had already overpowered him. Adili was “killed in cold blood,” said the mayor, who arrived at the scene shortly after the shooting. A second video shows Adili moving and rolling over on the ground after being shot, and it is not clear when he died.
Dmeidy said a Palestinian ambulance arrived minutes after the shooting, but security forces prevented medics from rendering assistance. Dmeidy said Israel did not hand over Adili’s body for burial.
Tor Wennesland, the UN special envoy for the Middle East peace process, tweeted that he was “appalled” by the shooting and expressed “his heartfelt condolences to his grieving family.” He called for a thorough investigation and said those responsible must be held accountable.
Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Emmanuel Nahshon accused the envoy of distorting reality.
“This incident is a terrorist attack in which an Israeli police officer was stabbed in the face and another officer’s life threatened and then shot his assailant,” Nahshon wrote on Twitter.
On Saturday, shops along Hawara’s main street were closed in protest at the shooting.
A makeshift memorial marked the spot where Adili died, consisting of a Palestinian flag on a short pole and a death placard leaning against it. The poster, with a photo of Adili, said Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’ Fatah party mourned the loss of their son “who was killed by the Zionist occupation.”
The video of Adili’s final moments was a rare documentation of one of the increasingly common violent incidents involving Israeli security forces and Palestinians, including attackers.
Meanwhile, Israeli planes struck several Hamas-linked locations in the Gaza Strip early Sunday, hours after Palestinian militants fired a rocket at southern Israel, apparently linked to rising tensions in the occupied West Bank, Israel said.
The Israeli military said the airstrikes targeted an arms factory and an underground tunnel owned by Hamas, the militant group that has controlled Gaza since 2007. The military said more projectiles were being fired across the border while warplanes hit Gaza sites.
Rising Israeli-Palestinian tensions have made 2022 the deadliest year in the West Bank and East Jerusalem in the long-running conflict since 2006. Further escalation is likely as the most right-wing and religious government in Israel’s history is set to be installed in the coming weeks when former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu returns to power.
More than 140 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli-Palestinian fighting this year. The Israeli army says most of the Palestinians killed were militants. But stone-throwing youth protesting the Israeli army’s invasion and others not involved in confrontations were also killed.
Friday’s deadly shooting came amid months of Israeli detentions in the West Bank sparked by a spring spate of Palestinian attacks on Israelis that killed 19 people. The military says the raids are meant to smash militant networks and thwart future attacks, but the Palestinians say they are solidifying Israel’s indefinite occupation, now in its 56th year. A recent spate of Palestinian attacks on Israeli targets killed another nine people.
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Akram reported from Hamilton, Ontario.