18-year-old Hala Salem Darwish is on life support at Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in Deir el-Balah, Gaza. According to family members, she was shot in the head by an Israeli sniper while preparing dinner for her family. Hala was sheltering in the Maghazi refugee camp in central Gaza and eagerly anticipating her wedding, scheduled for May 1: her henna was ready, and arrangements for the celebration were finalized. However, the sniper's bullet shattered these dreams. She now lies in critical condition in the intensive care unit and may join the over 72,000 Palestinians killed by Israel since October 2023.
In the Jalazone refugee camp in the occupied West Bank, 13-year-old Mohammad Saber al-Sheikh was playing football outside his home when Israeli forces raided the camp. His father, Saber al-Sheikh, reported that a sniper's bullet entered and exited the boy's head. Mohammad is receiving treatment at Istishari Arab Hospital in Ramallah, West Bank, where doctors noted that a portion of his brain protruded from the wound. He remains in the neurology intensive care unit under continuous sedation to control brain pressure. His father described him as a hardworking boy who loves football.
The cases of Hala and Mohammad are part of a broader surge in Israeli violence against Palestinian minors. In Hebron, 16-year-old Mohammad Majdi al-Jabari was killed after being struck by a vehicle in the security convoy of Israeli Minister Orit Strock. On Sunday, Israeli forces and settlers killed at least four Palestinians, including two boys aged 14 and 16, in the occupied West Bank. In Gaza, despite a "ceasefire" in place since October 2025, at least seven Palestinians, including a child, were killed. Israel has breached the US-brokered "ceasefire," allegedly killing nearly 800 Palestinians.
Palestinian journalist Marium Barghouti stated that Israel has "intensified and increasingly violent" attacks in the occupied West Bank, "with the purpose of dispossessing Palestinians from their homes and lands." Thousands of Palestinians have been displaced in the West Bank due to rising settler violence and Israeli crackdowns. Over 700,000 settlers live in illegal settlements built on private Palestinian land, considered the biggest obstacle to realizing Palestinian statehood as part of the so-called two-state solution.
A report published on Monday by a group of international humanitarian organizations claimed that Israeli soldiers have used sexual abuse to force Palestinians out of their homes in the occupied West Bank. The report said, "Sexualised violence is used to pressure communities, shape decisions about remaining or leaving their homes and land, and alter patterns of daily life."
Source: www.aljazeera.com