The seven‑month‑old infant Sam Fahed Abu Haikal was slain on Friday after Israeli soldiers opened fire at his family’s vehicle, injuring both parents, in the Tel Romeida area of Hebron city, in the occupied West Bank’s southern region.
The Palestinian Health Ministry said the infant, his mother, and his father were all shot when Israeli soldiers opened fire at their car on Friday evening in the Tel Romeida area, south of Hebron.
Local sources said Israeli soldiers fired live rounds at the family’s vehicle in the Wadi al‑Hariya neighborhood of Hebron, causing a critical injury to the infant, who later died of his wounds. His mother and father sustained moderate injuries.
The child’s father, Fahed Abdul‑Aziz Abu Haikal, a lecturer at Palestine Al‑Ahliyya University in Bethlehem, lives in Bethlehem with his wife and their infant son, Sam.
While driving to his mother’s home in Tel Romeida, Israeli soldiers opened fire at the car, wounding him in the hand and injuring his wife with the same bullet that penetrated the jaw of their infant son. All three were transferred to a hospital for treatment.
Feryal Abu Haikal, the infant’s grandmother, who was sitting in the front passenger seat, said the soldiers opened fire from a distance of about ten meters, directly at the vehicle, even though it had come to a complete stop and posed no threat.
She explained that the family was returning from her son Fahed’s home in Bethlehem to her house in Hebron, near the area of the so‑called “Checkpoint 17” in Wadi al‑Hariya. She added that her son took this route to avoid traffic congestion.
It is worth mentioning that late Thursday night, Israeli occupation forces shot and killed an 18‑year‑old Palestinian during an invasion of the village of Beitin, east of Ramallah, in central West Bank.
The Palestinian Ministry of Health said it was formally notified by the General Authority of Civil Affairs that the slain Palestinian was identified as Haitham Ezzeddine Omar Hamida, 18.
Last Sunday evening, Israeli occupation forces shot and killed a Palestinian man evening at the Etzion junction south of Bethlehem in the southern occupied West Bank, the Palestinian Ministry of Health has confirmed.
The Health Ministry said it was officially informed by the Civil Affairs Authority of the killing of Amjad Jawad Abdul‑Fattah Natsha, 31, from Hebron in the southern West Bank, after Israeli forces opened fire on him at the heavily militarized junction.
Since the beginning of this year, Israeli soldiers and illegal paramilitary Israeli colonizers have killed 68 Palestinians in several parts of the occupied West Bank, including 17 killed by colonizers. Among the slain Palestinians are 16 children, 5 women, 2 elders, and 1 journalist.
Israel continues to withhold the bodies of 19 Palestinians slain by its forces, refusing to transfer them to their families.
