Ref: 6/2013
Date: 24 January 2013
Time: 10:30 GMT

On Wednesday evening, 23 January 2013, the Israeli forces killed a Palestinian woman and wounded another one in Hebron in the south of the West Bank.
According to investigations conducted by the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR) and eyewitnesses’ accounts, at approximately 14:00 on Wednesday, an Israeli car (white Toyota Corolla) was traveling near the main road known bypass road #60 close to al-Arroub Agricultural College in Hebron. Two Israeli soldiers in the military uniform were traveling in the car. A number of Palestinian boys who were in the area threw stones at the car, which immediately stopped near the sub-entrance of the College that has been closed for several years by the Israeli forces using an iron gate. One of the soldier stepped down from the car and indiscriminately opened fire from a machine gun at the branch road leading to the College. As a result, Lubna Moneer al-Hanash, 21, from Jabal al-Mawaleh village east of Bethlehem, was killed by a bullet to the head, and Su’ad Kahlil Ja’ara, 37, was wounded by a bullet to the left hand. Both women were on the branch road nearly 50 meters away from the abovementioned bypass road. The two women were evacuated to the National Hospital in Hebron. Soon after, the Israeli forces and police arrived at the scene and declared the area a closed military zone. A number of residents of al-Arroub refugee camp, which is nearly 200 meters away from the scene of the crime and clashed erupted between them and the Israeli forces, which fired tear gas canisters and sound bombs. A number of civilians suffered from tear gas inhalation.
PCHR expresses deep concern for this crime which reflects the continued use of excessive force by Israeli forces against Palestinian civilians in disregard of their lives.
PCHR calls upon the international community to take immediate and effective actions to put an end to such crimes and reiterates its call for the High Contracting Parties to the Fourth Geneva Convention to fulfill their obligations under Article 1, i.e. to respect and to ensure respect for the Convention in all circumstances, and their obligation under Article 146 to prosecute persons who allegedly committed grave breaches of the Fourth Geneva Convention. These grave breaches constitute war crimes under Article 147 of the same Convention and Article 85 of Protocol I Additional to the Geneva Conventions.
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