‘I can’t feel my leg’: Israeli gunfire disables teenagers in West Bank

Nablus, occupied West Bank – Islam Madani says families and young people from the Askar refugee camp would once congregate beneath the olive trees on the slopes of Tel Askar, a hilly area in the north of the occupied West Bank which is home to the camp. “But most won’t go anymore because soldiers shoot so many people there,” the 32-year-old father of two told Al Jazeera. Amjad Refaee, director of the Askar Social Development Centre, says memories of those killed by Israeli soldiers haunt one of the only green spaces in the camp where children can play. The military has killed three teenagers there, and maimed many more since October 7, 2023, when Hamas led an attack on Israel, and Israel began its genocidal war on Gaza. The soldiers no longer fire rubber bullets or aim below the waist, “they shoot to kill, or cause disability”, Refaee told Al Jazeera. “We are animals to them,” he added. “They terrorise us, kill our young people in cold blood, and keep us here in a prison.” People from the camp say Tel Askar has become the entrance point used by invading Israeli soldiers as they infiltrate the narrow and dilapidated streets of the camp, often via the illegal settlement of Elon Moreh that looms over the east of Nablus. It was on the hill where soldiers shot 18-year-old Amir Othman last January, leaving him with a disability. The shooting was almost at the exact spot where his childhood friend Mohammed Abu Haneen was killed by the army just over a year before. He was 18.