New Crime of Extrajudicial Execution … Israeli Occupation Forces Kill Three Palestinians in Jenin

Ref: 80/2022

Date: 17 June 2022

Time: 13:00 GMT

In a new crime of extrajudicial execution (assassination), Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) directly opened fire at 3 Palestinians and killed them after surrounding and targeting their vehicle in Jenin, northern West Bank.  Eight others were injured; one sustained a serious injury in subsequent clashes.

The Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR) strongly condemns IOF’s ongoing extrajudicial executions, which is an official and declared policy of Israel that killed hundreds of Palestinian political figures and activists, in grave violation of the principles of the intentional humanitarian law (IHL) that prohibits this kind of murders.

 According to PCHR’s investigations, at around 03:20 on Friday, 17 June 2022, during their incursion into the eastern neighborhood of Jenin, IOF surrounded a Palestinian vehicle “white Mazda” in al-Dabbous area in the eastern neighborhood, and opened fire at there persons inside, killing them immediately.  The 3 persons killed were identified as Yousif Naser Salah (23); Laith Salah Abu Srour (24), both from Jenin; and Baraa’ Kamal Lahlouh (24) from Jenin.

Afterwards, outraged persons gathered on the neighborhood streets and threw stones and empty bottles at IOF’s invading vehicles in the city while IOF fired live bullets at them, wounding 8 Palestinians, including one in serious condition.  All of the persons injured were taken to hospitals in Jenin. 

This is the second extrajudicial execution crime committed by IOF against Palestinian activists in 2022 as 3 activists were directly shot and killed on 08 February after IOF intercepted their vehicle in Nablus.

It should be noted that similar operations are conducted pursuant to Israeli Intelligence services’ knowledge, and those wanted are killed instantly instead of being arrested. Therefore, IOF play in these operations the judge’s role by deciding a death sentence and executing it at instant.

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Since the beginning of 2022, IOF murdered 60 Palestinians, including 46 civilians: 13 children, 5 women (one was journalist Sherin Abu ‘Akleh) and the rest were activists; 6 of them were assassinated. Meanwhile, 879 Palestinians were injured, including 95 children, 4 women and 19 journalists. All of them are residents of the West Bank, including occupied East Jerusalem, except for 12 fishermen in the Gaza Strip.

PCHR condemns in the strongest terms the assassination crime and emphasizes that IOF have always used this type of crimes in the recent years against the Palestinians in light of international community silence, particularly the High Contracting Parties to the Fourth Geneva Convention, and inaction to stop these crimes and take effective measures against the Israeli occupation, encouraging Israel to commit further war crimes against the Palestinians.

PCHR calls on the international community to intervene immediately to end Israeli extra-judicial executions that are considered a form of summary execution without trial and bring the perpetrators to trial.