East Jerusalem youth was burned alive — Palestinian official

RAMALLAH — Violent protests sparked by the abduction and killing of a Palestinian teenager spread to Arab villages in Israel on Saturday, presenting a new challenge to the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Israel has stayed silent on the investigation into the death of an East Jerusalem youth who Palestinians believe was kidnapped and killed by far-right Jews, but the Palestinian attorney-general was reported as saying he had been burned alive.

“The direct cause of death was burns as a result of fire and its complications,” Mohammed Al A’wewy was quoted as saying by the official Palestinian news agency WAFA late on Friday.

Israeli-Palestinian tensions have risen sharply since three Israeli teens were kidnapped on June 12 and later found dead in the occupied West Bank.

This was followed on Wednesday by the kidnapping of Mohammed Abu Khdeir, 16, in his neighbourhood in East Jerusalem. His charred body was found hours later in a forest on the edge of the city.

Saber Al Aloul, the director of the Palestinian forensic institute, attended the autopsy, which was carried out by Israeli doctors. Al A’wewy said Al Aloul had reported soot had been found in Khdeir’s respiratory canal, which meant that “the boy had inhaled this material while he was burnt alive”.

Burns covered 90 per cent of the body and there was a cut to the head. Samples such as fluids and tissue were taken for more lab examinations to complete the legal medical report.

At Khdeir funeral on Friday, furious Palestinians chanted “Intifada! Intifada”, calling for a new uprising against Israel. 

Stones thrown at Israeli police were met by tear gas, stun grenades and rubber bullets in one of the most highly charged displays of enmity in Jerusalem in years.

At least one Palestinian was hurt in confrontations in the city of Nablus overnight, medical staff said.

Stone and firebomb attacks

The protests spread on Saturday to normally calm Arab Israeli areas, mainly along roads in the centre and north of the country where protesters threw stones and firebombs at passing cars. Dozens were arrested in these clashes, a police spokeswoman said.

A Jewish driver was forced from his vehicle and told to flee before his car was burned at one location while at another, a woman suffered light injuries from rocks thrown at her car.

Palestinian officials trying to calm tensions have said they would prevent any Intifada, or uprising, and seek a solution to the crisis that began when the three Israeli teens were kidnapped.

The discovery of the bodies of the three Jewish seminary students on Monday prompted an outpouring of national grief in Israel.

Many Palestinians, including President Mahmoud Abbas, assert that Khdeir was the victim of far-right Jews incensed at the Israeli deaths.

Netanyahu has called Abu Khdeir’s killing “loathsome” and ordered a swift police investigation.

Israeli authorities said they did not yet know whether Abu Khdeir was indeed the victim of a hate crime.

Tensions also persisted on Saturday along the frontier with the Gaza Strip, where Israeli warplanes bombed three Hamas targets in response to mortar and rocket fire at Israel.

There were no reported casualties in the air raids or from the 14 rockets fired at Israel.

Israel mobilised ground forces on Thursday along the Gaza frontier in a threat to invade if rocket fire from the enclave did not stop. Egypt, a bordering country, has tried to mediate a truce to prevent an escalation of these hostilities.