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Palestinians in Wadi Rahal were left to pick up the pieces after settler-soldiers from a nearby outpost stormed the village and killed one resident.

By Oren Ziv, +972 Magazine

On Tuesday morning, the streets of Wadi Rahal were littered with stones and bullet casings — evidence of an attack the night before. According to the Palestinian residents of the village, which is located south of Bethlehem in the occupied West Bank, about a dozen Israeli settlers had driven in, some of them armed. They threw stones at cars and houses, and when residents came out to defend themselves, the attackers opened fire.

One resident, 47-year-old Khalil Salem Ziadeh, who divided his time between Jerusalem and Wadi Rahal, was shot dead. Four others were wounded. Ziadeh’s family decided to bury him in the village, and hundreds of his relatives and local residents attended his funeral on Tuesday afternoon.

palestinians stand in smoke and fire

Ziadeh’s murder comes just two weeks after a pogrom in the village of Jit, where settlers set houses and cars on fire and shot dead another Palestinian man. Israeli political and security leaders, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and several members of his cabinet, were quick to condemn that attack — likely as a result of the heightened scrutiny resulting from international sanctions — and the head of the Shin Bet, Israel’s internal security service, penned a harsh letter condemning “Jewish terrorism.” But with only a handful of the more than 100 rioters arrested, their words rung hollow, and settler violence continues uninterrupted.

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Militarism and Foreign Policy