Israeli forces detained 17 Palestinians in predawn military raids carried out across the occupied West Bank on Monday, Palestinian sources and the Israeli army said.
Israeli forces stormed the village of Kafr Qaddum in northern occupied West Bank district of Qalqiliya and detained five Palestinians, three of whom were teenagers, Murad Shteiwi, a local activist and spokesperson in the village said.
He identified the detainees as 15-year-old Salah Mansour, his 16-year-old brother Subhi, 16-year-old Amer Muhammad Taha, 19-year-old Aref Marwan, and 26-year-old Aws Abd al-Raziq.
Shtweiw noted that the detention raid came as Kafr Qaddum was preparing to organize a major rally, marking the sixth anniversary of the village’s weekly Friday protest against Israeli land confiscations and the closure of the village’s southern road by Israeli forces.
An Israeli army spokesperson confirmed five detentions in Kafr Qaddum, and said that three additional Palestinians were also detained in nearby Qalqiliya city.
Meanwhile, Israeli forces detained two Palestinians, including one alleged “Hamas operative,” in the Ras al-Ein neighborhood of Nablus’ Old City in the northern occupied West Bank, according to the army.
In the central occupied West Bank district of Ramallah, two detentions were carried out in the village of Beit Liqya, and four in the village of Abud, the army spokesperson said, while one Palestinian was detained in the village of Husan in the southern Bethlehem district.
Israeli raids in Palestinian towns, villages, and refugee camps are a daily occurrence in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, with a weekly average of 95 search and detention raids carried out over the course 2016, according to UN documentation.
According to prisoners’ rights group Addameer, there were 6,200 Palestinians in Israeli prisons as of May, including 300 minors.
