By Awad Rjoub
RAMALLAH, Palestine (AA) – Four people were injured Saturday evening when illegal Israeli settlers stormed Qusra, a Palestinian town south of Nablus in the northern West Bank, accompanied by Israeli security officials.
The Palestinian Red Crescent Society said in a statement that its teams in Nablus transported four injured people to the hospital.
The injured include “a 27-year-old man shot in the back with live ammunition, a 27-year-old man shot in the leg with live ammunition, a 16-year-old boy hit by a rubber bullet, and a 25-year-old man struck in the chest by a gas canister,” the statement said.
The Palestinian Ministry of Health confirmed that one of them was critically injured by gunfire from Israeli forces in the town of Qusra and was taken to Rafidia governmental hospital.
The Palestinian news agency Wafa also reported that illegal Israeli settlers "attacked Qusra, firing live bullets at residents who rushed to defend themselves as the settlers attempted to assault homes.
“This resulted in a young man being shot in the back with live ammunition and another being injured by shrapnel; both were transported to the hospital by Red Crescent ambulances."
It news agency that the town "is under attack by settlers, protected by occupation (Israeli) forces, amid heavy gunfire from the settlers."
According to data from the Palestinian Authority's Colonization and Wall Resistance Commission, illegal Israeli settler attacks since Oct. 7 have killed 19 Palestinians, injured over 785 others, and displaced 26 Bedouin communities.
Based on information from the Israeli left-wing movement "Peace Now," approximately half a million Israelis live in 146 large illegal settlements and 144 outposts established on West Bank land, excluding occupied East Jerusalem.
The total number of Palestinians killed in the West Bank by the Israeli army and illegal Israeli settlers since Oct. 7 has reached 675, with more than 5,400 others injured, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry.
In a landmark advisory opinion on July 19, the International Court of Justice declared Israel's decades-long occupation of Palestinian land "illegal" and called for the evacuation of all existing settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.
*Writing by Rania Abu Shamala