A Palestinian child died on Thursday in the Palestinian town of Taqoa, , after falling from a height after being chased by Israeli soldiers.
The victim was identified by the Palestinian health ministry as 7-year-old Rayan Suleiman, a 2nd-grader in the local mixed primary school of Taqoa.
“Rayan was the youngest of his siblings,” Munir Suleiman, his uncle told . “, Rayan liked to play and learn, spending his time between school and home, and was really loved by all the family”, he said.
“Israeli soldiers entered the town when children were coming out of school and chased them in the streets, as usually happens,"Suleiman added.
“A group of about ten , where he panicked and fell off a high wall," he said.
“The soldiers left immediately, while Rayan’s parents took him to the hospital, where I joined them”, he went on. “The boy’s heart had stopped and doctors tried to revive it for more than 40 minutes, before pronouncing him dead”, he added.
The family says that Rayan’s heart stopped because of the panic he suffered after being chased by Israeli soldiers, before he fell.
His body was kept for autopsy, and it is due to be buried on Friday.
said the army will investigate the event, according to Israeli media reports.
“The primary and middle schools are located exactly at the main street, where Israeli soldiers usually pass”, Mohammad Badan, the secretary of the Palestinian Fatah movement in Taqoa, told .
“Israeli forces forbid the town from putting signs or any infrastructure on the street, and accuse older students of throwing stones in the street, and regularly chase them into the centre of the town,” he pointed out.
“Rayan happened to be there when this happened again today,” he added.
The death of Rayan Suleiman comes amid increasing Israeli attacks in the West Bank, with confrontations between Palestinians and Israeli forces in recent weeks.
, in the northern west Bank.