Qalqilia / PNN - At 1:30 am Sunday the village of Azzun in the West Bank’s Qalqilia was invaded by 120 Israeli soldiers looking for a “wanted” teenager.
After ransacking three homes Israeli forces blasted into a fourth through the back door. They threw rocks at the door and windows, report witnesses.
A 16 year old high school student had begun a summer job with his father as an apprentice carpenter. Israeli soldiers took the teen from his bed: no shoes and in his underpants.
The boy’s parents pleaded with the Israeli soldiers that their child be allowed to dress.
Soldiers claimed they were only taking the 16 year old for a “minute or two.” His family has not seen him since, reports the International Women’s Peace Service, a humanitarian mission based in the West Bank’s Salfit.
The youth's parents did not know why he was arrested, but said they have faced a similar situation before. When their eldest son was just 12 years old he was also taken by soldiers who said they would return him after a “couple of minutes.” Instead, he was imprisoned in Israeli prison and released three years later.
A second son was reportedly shot to death while with two friends in March 2003 by soldiers beside Highway 55.
The Israeli soldiers who did not deliver first aid then left the boy’s body outside the District Coordinating Office in Qalqilia, and the army later claimed the youth had died after he fell and broke his neck.
With one son killed and the other missing, the Qalqilia parents are distraught.
