RAMALLAH, August 2 (JMCC) - The family of a Palestinian killed last week outside the settlement of Barkan says Bilal Abu Libdeh had gone to the settlement to find work, disputing the military's account that he was an infiltrator.
His family reject this scenario, saying that Bilal, who worked as a labourer on construction sites but had been unable to find stable employment in recent years, had gone to the settlement to find work.
The family says that friends had told Bilal he could find paid construction jobs without the need of an Israeli issued work permit at the settlement. Thursday morning would be the first and last time Bilal would try to work in Barqan.
He was just waiting with a group of other workers, for the Israelis inside Barqan to come and let them in. An Israeli jeep stopped nearby, saw the group and started firing, so everybody ran, Abu Jihad says.
Bilal’s family said he was shot twice, once in the head and once in the abdomen. Abu Jihad says that whilst he hoped the soldiers that killed his nephew would be brought to justice, he was not optimistic they would be punished.
The people in Qalqilya, the people in Palestine have seen this before. I wish the soldiers would be sent to prison, but the cooperation between the soldiers and the settlements is too much, he says.
Read the story at the
Palestine Monitor...