MOHMAS, West Bank (AP) — Israeli settlers in the occupied West Bank shot and killed a Palestinian-American man during an attack on a village, the Palestinian Health Ministry and a witness said Thursday.
Raed Abu Ali, a resident of Muhemmas, said a group of settlers came to the village on Wednesday afternoon and attacked a farmer, sparking clashes after residents intervened. Israeli troops later arrived and armed settlers killed 19-year-old Nasrallah Abu Siyam and wounded several others in violence.
Abu Ali said troops fired tear gas, sonic grenades and live ammunition. The Israeli military acknowledged using so-called “riot dispersal methods” after receiving reports of stone-throwing Palestinians, but denied its troops fired shots during the clashes.
“When the settlers saw the army, they were inspired and started firing live ammunition,” Abu Ali said. He added that after the injured fell to the ground, they beat them with sticks.
The Palestinian Health Ministry confirmed that Abu Siam died of serious injuries near the eastern village of Ramallah on Wednesday afternoon.
Abu Siam’s killing is the latest in a surge in violence in the occupied West Bank. According to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, Israeli forces and settlers killed 240 Palestinians last year. During the same period, Palestinians killed 17 Israelis, six of whom were soldiers. The Palestinian Authority’s Wall and Settlement Resistance Committee said Abu Siam was the first Palestinian killed by settlers in 2026.
Muhemmas and its surrounding areas – much of which falls under Israeli civilian and military administration – have become hotspots for settler attacks, including arson and attacks, as well as the construction of outposts that are considered illegal under Israeli law.
The Israeli military said late Wednesday that unnamed suspects opened fire on Palestinians, who were later evacuated for medical treatment. It did not say whether anyone had been arrested.
Abu Siam’s mother told The Associated Press that he was a U.S. citizen, making him the second Palestinian American killed by Israeli settlers in less than a year.
A spokesman for the US Embassy said they “condemned this act of violence”.
Palestinians and human rights groups say authorities often do not prosecute settlers or hold them accountable for violence.
UN says Israeli actions in West Bank may be ethnic cleansing
The U.N. human rights office on Thursday accused Israel of committing war crimes and said efforts to expel Palestinians and change the demographic makeup of the occupied West Bank “raised concerns about ethnic cleansing.”
Citing findings collected between November 2024 and October 2025, the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights said Israel was making a “concerted effort to accelerate the consolidation of annexation” while maintaining a system that “maintains oppression and domination of the Palestinians.”
As Israeli settlements and outposts expand, residents of Palestinian villages and pastoralist communities are increasingly displaced. Since the war between Israel and Hamas began, Israeli rights group B’Tselem said some 45 Palestinian neighborhoods have been completely emptied due to Israeli demolition orders and settler attacks.
Additionally, the office said Israeli military operations in the northern West Bank “have employed means and methods designed for war,” including deadly airstrikes and the forcible removal of civilians from their homes. The report also said Israel “forbids” residents from returning to their homes in refugee camps in the northern West Bank. Israel said the operation targeted militants and displaced tens of thousands of Palestinians.
The report also accused Palestinian security forces of using unnecessary lethal force in the same area, killing at least eight people, and noted that the Palestinian Authority “intimidated, detained and abused journalists, human rights defenders and other individuals deemed critical of its rule.”
Neither the Israeli Foreign Ministry nor the Palestinian Authority responded to requests for comment. Israel has repeatedly accused the U.N. human rights office of anti-Israel bias.
Last year, the United Nations human rights monitoring body warned that “genocide is taking place in Gaza” and that “living conditions are increasingly incompatible with (Palestinians’) continued existence”. Their report on Thursday also warned that demographic changes in Gaza raised concerns of ethnic cleansing.
Report finds jailed Palestinian journalists tortured
Dozens of Palestinian journalists detained in Israel during the Gaza war experienced physical assault, forced stress positions, sensory deprivation, sexual violence and medical neglect, the Committee to Protect Journalists said.
CPJ has documented the detention of at least 94 Palestinian journalists and one media worker from the West Bank, Gaza and Israel during the war, of whom 30 remain in detention.
The report found that half of the journalists had never been charged with a crime and were detained under Israel’s administrative detention system, which allows suspects deemed security risks to be detained for six months, which can be extended indefinitely.
Israel’s prison service did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the report, but in January it rejected a similar report on conditions for Palestinian prisoners, calling it “false accusations” and claiming it operated legally and was subject to oversight and review of complaints.
UN development chief says clearing Gaza rubble will take 7 years
The vast destruction in Gaza will take at least seven years to clear the rubble, according to the United Nations Development Programme.
Former Belgian Prime Minister Alexandre De Croo, who just returned from Gaza, said that the United Nations Development Program had only cleared 0.5% of the rubble and that the people of Gaza were experiencing “the worst living conditions I have ever seen.”
De Croo said 90 percent of Gaza’s 2.2 million people live in “very, very primitive tents” amid the ruins, posing a risk to health and weapons explosions.
He said UNDP had been able to build 500 improved homes and had 4,000 more ready, but estimated the real need was 200,000 to 300,000. These units are intended for temporary use during reconstruction. He called on Israel to expand access to goods and items needed for reconstruction and for the private sector to begin developing.
___ Lidman reported from Tel Aviv, Israel. Associated Press writers Edith Lederer at the United Nations, Sam Metz in Jerusalem and Natalie Melzer in Nahariya, Israel, contributed to this report.
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