Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president, has called for international protection for Palestinians in the occupied territories against a background of continuing bloodshed and the absence of any hope for the renewal of peace negotiations any time soon.
Shortly after Abbas made his appeal at the UN human rights council in Geneva on Wednesday soldiers shot a Palestinian dead at a security checkpoint in the West Bank town of Hebron, where hundreds of militant Jewish settlers live and there is also strong support for the Islamist movement Hamas.
Maan, the Palestinian news agency, cited unnamed witnesses saying that Israeli troops shot the man 11 times and planted a knife by his corpse. Israel TV reported that he had tried to stab soldiers and had been “neutralised”. Palestinians also rallied to call for the release of the bodies of people killed in previous incidents.
Meanwhile, an Israeli woman was reportedly attacked and injured by a knife-wielding Palestinian outside a supermarket in the Gush Etzion bloc of Jewish settlements further north. The Palestinian was arrested later.
In the last five weeks 11 Israelis have been killed by Palestinians, mostly in stabbings. And 55 Palestinians – including 36 described by Israel as attackers – have been killed by Israeli fire.
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