A week after he was shot in his West Bank village, Fadi al-Nassan’s death comes amid a surge in settler violence

A Palestinian teenager who played for his country’s national youth football team has died from a gunshot wound sustained when Israeli settlers attacked his village in the occupied West Bank, officials and his relatives have said.

Fadi Hamdallah al-Nassan, 17, was shot on July 11 and succumbed to his injuries on Saturday.

His death has drawn new attention to the escalating violence carried out by Israeli settlers and soldiers against Palestinian communities across the West Bank, territory Israel has occupied since 1967 and where settlement building has expanded at an accelerating rate despite being illegal under international law.

Rights groups and the United Nations have described Israel’s actions in the West Bank as a system of apartheid.

Al-Nassan played for Al-Mughayyir Club and was a member of the Palestinian national youth team.

Dozens of mourners dressed in black carried his body from the Palestine Medical Complex in Ramallah to his home village, al-Mughayyir, for burial on Saturday.

The Palestine Football Association (PFA) said Israeli forces shot al-Nassan in the thigh while settlers were attacking the village. His leg was later amputated, and he died from the injuries, the association said.

“With Fadi’s departure, the number of martyrs from the Palestinian sports movement since October 7, 2023, rises to 1,013 martyrs, including 568 martyrs from the Palestinian football family,” the association said in a statement on X.

His father, Hamdallah al-Nassan, said his son had run towards the scene after hearing women and girls screaming during the assault.

“He went to the scene of the attack and was killed,” he said.

“He was a good student, good in sports, and loved playing football. Everyone loved him,” his mother, Hanan al-Nassan, said.

Violence across the West Bank

Separately on Saturday, Israeli settlers and forces set fire to Palestinian property in two separate attacks in the occupied West Bank, destroying olive trees near Ramallah and a family home near Nablus, according to the Palestinian news agency Wafa.

The attacks came the same day Israeli forces raided homes in towns near Jenin, in the latest example of the incursions and settler violence that Palestinian communities across the territory face on a near-daily basis.

In Deir Qaddis, west of Ramallah, Israeli soldiers fired live rounds and tear gas at Palestinian farmers working their land, starting fires that tore through olive groves, Wafa said.

Civil defence crews were prevented from reaching the site, allowing the blaze to spread further.

Near Nablus, a group of settlers set fire to a Palestinian family’s home in the town of Tal, destroying it completely, Wafa reported.

Israeli forces also raided homes in Yabad and Mithlon, near Jenin, part of what residents describe as an almost daily pattern of incursions and settler attacks.