Murder of East Jerusalem teen triggers outrage inPalestinian territories

(Xinhua) 09:38, July 03, 2014

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RAMALLAH, July 2 -- The murder of a 17-year-old teenager from Shu'fat, a Palestinianneighborhood of East Jerusalem, sparked on Wednesday an outrage among Palestinians inthe West Bank and the Gaza Strip.

The Palestinians and the family of the killed teenager Mohamed Abu Khdeir, accused theIsraeli settlers of kidnapping and murder in revenge for the three recently abducted andkilled Israeli teenagers, who were last seen in southern West Bank on June 12.

The Palestinian National Authority (PNA) leadership called on the Israeli government tocarry out immediate measures to stop assaults by Israeli settlers against the Palestiniansin Jerusalem and in the West Bank.

"The practices of the settlers are criminal and racist," said an official statement issuedfollowing a meeting of the Palestinian leadership in Ramallah, chaired by PalestinianPresident Mahmoud Abbas. "Abducting, killing and burning the body of the teenager is anawful crime," the statement added.

Earlier on Wednesday, an Israeli police spokesperson told Xinhua that the body was foundin the Jerusalem forest about an hour after the police received a report on a missingteenager in Jerusalem. The police are still investigating a possible connection to thereported kidnapping.

The spokesman said that in early morning, an eyewitness reported he saw a teenagerforced into a vehicle near Beit Hanina, an Arab neighborhood of Jerusalem. About the sametime, the police received a report from a family that a 17-year-old teenager was missingwhen he went to the mosque near his home.

President Abbas condemned the killing of the Palestinian teenager and called on IsraeliPrime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to officially condemn the tragedy.

Netanyahu has reportedly instructed his minister of interior security to enhanceinvestigation and find the murderers. Netanyahu was quoted as saying that the killing ofthe Palestinian boy "was an awful assault."

The teenager's death sparked violent confrontations between the residents of several Arabneighborhoods in east Jerusalem and the Israeli police. Medical sources said that morethan 40 Palestinians were injured in the clashes.

Meanwhile, Islamic Hamas movement condemned in a statement what it described as "theawful crime committed by the settlers. Hamas also called on President Mahmoud Abbas tostop security cooperation with Israel.

Tawfeek Tirawi, former chief of the Palestinian security intelligence, said in a pressstatement that "the coalition of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the radical right-wing in Israel "are fully responsible for the awful crimes they are carrying out against thePalestinian people."

Tensions have been running ever high between Israel and the Palestinians since Israelannounced that three Israeli teenagers were kidnapped in southern West Bank on earlierlast month. Two days ago, Israel announced that the three were found dead near thesouthern West Bank city of Hebron.

Israel held Hamas movement responsible for kidnapping and killing the three Israelis andlaunched a large-scale offensive in the West Bank. During the offensive, seven Palestinianswere killed, three houses were demolished and more than 500 were detained.

(Editor:Wang Xin、Huang Jin)