Israel Returns Bodies of 3 Palestinian Attackers from Jerusalem

“From January to August 2013, compared to the same period in 2012, the number of casualties caused by Israeli security forces increased more than four-fold, as security forces intervene in settler attacks or resulting clashes between settlers and Palestinians to disperse Palestinians, rather than to protect them from attacks by settlers.”

Allyan’s home is an apartment on the second floor of a three-story building, measuring 130 square meters and now housing eight family members.

“I don’t have any other place to live”, Allyan’s father Mohammed said.

Meanwhile, an Israeli woman soldier was shot and slightly wounded in the flashpoint West Bank city of Hebron on Sunday, rescue services said.

The latest act of collective punishment was executed by troops in the Jabal al-Mukabbir district of East Jerusalem.

An Israel-based human rights center B’Tselem claims since 2004 in East Jerusalem alone 579 homes were demolished and 2,133 people left homeless, including 1,158 minors.

It was condemned across the Israeli political spectrum and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu pledged “zero tolerance” in the fight to bring the assailants to justice.

In the same period, 22 Israelis, an American and an Eritrean have been killed in a wave of Palestinian attacks including stabbings, auto rammings and gunfire targeting security forces and civilians.

According to the United Nations, 19 homes of families and neighbours of Palestinian attackers were destroyed by Israel past year.

The bodies of both men are still being held by Israeli authorities, a common practice which has added to tensions.

In the high-profile arson killings in the West Bank two people were charged.

Amiram Ben-Uliel, 21, from the northern settlement of Shilo in the occupied West Bank, was charged with three counts of murder and one of attempted murder, arson and conspiracy to commit a hate crime, said the Israeli court indictment.

In Bethlehem district, Israeli forces detain 17-year-old Ahmad Salti Thawabta., while further north, in Nablus district, Israeli forces detained Rami Khweiraand Ahmad Abed Rabbo, 20.