Israeli troops killed a Palestinian teenager in the occupied West Bank on Friday and arrested 25 people, pursuing a weeklong crackdown against Palestinians and house-to-house raids for three Israeli teenagers who went missing eight days ago.
Palestinian medics said Mohammed Jihad Dudin was killed in the village of Dura, near the city of Hebron in the West Bank, Ma’an news agency reported. The Israeli military said troops had fired live ammunition when rocks and firebombs were thrown at them during an arrest raid.
According to Ma’an, Dudin died after being shot in the chest by live bullets. He was 14 years old.
Israel said it arrested 25 people overnight in some 200 towns, refugee camps and cities in the West Bank, totalling 330 arrests including 240 from Hamas, the Islamist group Israel accuses of kidnapping three Israeli teenagers who went missing near a Zionist settlement on June 13.
Dudin was the second Palestinian youth killed since these raids began.
Palestinians threw a hand grenade wounding a soldier lightly elsewhere in the West Bank, the Israeli military claimed.
Some 1,150 homes and offices in the territory have thus far been searched, the military said, in its mission to deal a blow to Hamas while in pursuit of the three Israeli teenagers.
Numerous photos in the past week showed Palestinian homes in complete disarray after Israeli soldiers turned over and broke furniture in their search for the teenagers.
Israel has yet to provide concrete evidence behind its claims that Hamas is responsible for the disappearance of the three settlers.
Farhan Haq, a spokesperson for UN leader Ban Ki-Moon, said Tuesday that the United Nations has no "concrete evidence" that the Israeli teens were "actually" kidnapped by Hamas.
Israel has also struck out at welfare organisations it accuses of aiding Hamas. Soldiers raided 30 such institutions on Thursday.
Reuters television footage showed soldiers loading files and computers from an office called "Islamic Charitable Society" in Hebron, onto a truck.
Israel also said it was shutting down activities of the British-based Islamic Relief Worldwide (IRW).
In the Gaza Strip, Israel carried out three air strikes overnight.
There were no reported casualties in these attacks.
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas has condemned the kidnappings but has charged that the extent of Israel's raids amounted to collective punishment and urged they be condemned.
Hamas has dismissed Israel's accusations as "stupid," but spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri said in Gaza on Thursday "regardless of who was responsible ... the Palestinian people have the right to use all forms of resistance in order to liberate land and people."
(Reuters, Al-Akhbar, Ma’an)
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