Israeli forces have shot dead a 72-year-old Palestinian woman amid clashes across Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories.
On Friday afternoon, Israeli troops fatally shot Thawarat Ashrawi as she drove her car into a gas station in Halhul, a town in the Al-Khalil-area of the West Bank, Al Jazeera reported.
Ashrawi’s family told Al Jazeera that she was simply at the gas station to fill her car up.
The Israeli military, however, said the woman had driven her car directly at soldiers at the station, before she was shot.
Ashrawi was the second Palestinian to be killed by Israeli forces on Friday.
In Gaza, Israeli forces shot and killed 23-year-old Salameh Abu Jamaa, as dozens of Palestinians protested on the Israeli border in the Khan Younis area of the strip’s south.
Israeli forces injured at least 38 protesters, including 29 with live ammunition, according to Ashraf Qidra, a spokesman for Gaza’s Ministry of Health.
Triggered by Israeli incursions into the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound, protests against Israel’s ongoing occupation have spread throughout the occupied West Bank, including East Beit-ul-Moqaddas, and the besieged Gaza Strip.
Israeli soldiers have responded with force, using live ammunition, rubber-coated steel bullets, tear gas and stun grenades.
Since October 1, Israeli soldiers or settlers have killed at least 76 Palestinians, including bystanders, unarmed protesters and alleged attackers. Ten Israelis have also been killed by Palestinians.
