The international community must implement serious solutions to end the brutality of the IOF
Arab Organisation for Human Rights in the UK (AOHR UK) stressed that the killing of a Palestinian citizen with a disability at the hands of the Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) with live bullets on Saturday morning 30th May 2020 in Jerusalem, reveals the brutality of the IOF and their unjustified thirst to use lethal force against the Palestinians.
The IOF used live ammunitions against the Palestinian citizen Iyad Khairy Al-Hallaq, 32, who suffered from autism, near Bab Al-Asbat area as he was fleeing without posing any threat.
According to eyewitnesses, the young man who suffers from autism and his level of thinking is of a child at seven, was ordered to stop by the IOF while he was en route to Al-Bakriya special educational school in Bab Al-Asbat, but he panicked and started fleeing. The IOF used live bullets at the disabled man, killing him immediately.
AOHR UK pointed out that the killing of Al-Hallaq is not the first of its kind. On May 29, a young man with Down syndrome was injured in the village of Nabi Saleh, and a young man whose car slipped in Wadi Raya near the village of Nabi Saleh was also killed. A motorbike driver was shot near a checkpoint leading to Bethlehem. Mustafa Younus, who suffered from epilepsy, was killed with seven bullets while he was leaving Tel Hashomer Hospital, after completing his epilepsy treatment sessions on May 13.
Since there is no signs that the IOF is willing to end its policies of targeting Palestinians with lethal force, or to abide by their obligations under international law, AOHR UK called on the international community to take the necessary urgent action to stop the IOF from using excessive force against the Palestinians.
AOHR UK also asserted that the systematic use of live ammunition against unarmed Palestinians without justification is a serious crime that requires immediate investigation and trial of the perpetrators.
