Rani Walid Qotnat

May 10, 2023: Rani Walid Ahmad Qotnat, 24, was killed by undercover Israeli soldiers who also killed another young man, in Qabatia town, south of Jenin, in the northern part of the occupied West Bank.

The head of the Jenin governmental hospital, Wisam Bakr, said the soldiers fatally shot Rani, from the Jenin refugee camp, and Ahmad Jamal Tawfiq Assaf, 19, from Qabatia, south of Jenin.

Bakr added that the soldiers also shot and seriously injured Aws Hamamda with live rounds in the chest and abdomen before he was rushed to Ar-Razi hospital in Jenin, where he was rushed to surgery and remained in critical condition.

The soldiers closed the area where they killed the two young men, and refused to allow anybody, including medics, to approach them and only withdrew after ensuring the two were dead.

Ahmad Jamal Assaf

Rani’s uncle said his nephew was an athlete who played soccer at a local club and was previously abducted and imprisoned by Israel for two years, and that he was also previously injured by the soldiers who shot him with two live rounds.

The soldiers shot Rani with a live round in the chest in his car before they ran toward him and fired many live rounds at him to ensure his death.

Eyewitnesses said a large Israeli military force in armored vehicles invaded the town before the soldiers stormed and ransacked many homes, causing damage.

The Palestinians were shot when the army fired a barrage of live rounds at a Palestinian car in the town.

In the Gaza Strip, Thirteen Palestinians, including women and children, were killed on Tuesday dawn, and two were killed in renewed Israeli strikes in the evening of the same day.

The Health Ministry said the number of Palestinians killed by Israeli soldiers and colonizers since the beginning of this year has reached 127, including 24 children and six women.

The Palestinians declared a general strike in the Jenin governorate to mourn the death of the two young men.

Rani was from the Jenin refugee camp, in Jenin, in the northern part of the occupied West Bank. Source: IMEMC