Palestinian boy wounded by Israeli army in Gaza dies

Palestinian demonstrators burn tires during a protest along the border fence in the southern Gaza Strip on Aug. 25, 2021. Violence earlier erupted after Israeli soldiers responded with live fire against the protesters. (AFP)

• An Israeli police officer was also shot, and remains in a critical condition
• More protests are planned for Saturday evening, according to Palestinian sources

JERUSALEM: A 12-year-old Palestinian boy shot last week by Israeli soldiers during clashes along the border with Gaza has died of his injuries, the territory’s health ministry said Saturday.
Omar Hassan Abu Al-Nile was hit during clashes last Saturday on the sidelines of a demonstration near the border fence separating the Gaza Strip and the Jewish state, the official Palestinian news agency Wafa said.
He “succumbed to his injuries,” the Gaza’s health ministry said in a statement.
The August 21 unrest left around 40 people wounded, according to Gaza’s Hamas rulers, including a 32-year-old Palestinian man who died on Wednesday.
An Israeli police officer was also shot, and remains in a critical condition.
The Israeli army said it had responded with live fire and other measures to Palestinian “rioters” who were hurling explosives over the border fence and attempting to scale it.
Following the clashes, Israel carried out air strikes it said were targeting weapons manufacturing and storage sites of the Islamist group Hamas.
Israel struck Gaza again overnight Monday-Tuesday in response to incendiary balloons that sparked multiple fires in Israel’s southern Eskhol region.
There were no reported casualties from the strikes.
New clashes took place on the border between Gaza and Israel on Wednesday, but they were less violent than those on Saturday.
More protests are planned for Saturday evening, according to Palestinian sources.
The protests come just over three months after an informal truce ended 11 days of conflict between Hamas and Israel, the worst fighting between the two sides in years.
Hamas authorities said 260 Palestinians were killed by Israeli air strikes during the conflict, including fighters.
Palestinian groups launched thousands of rockets at Israel during the fighting, killing 13 people, including a soldier, according to the military and police.
In 2018, Gazans began a protest movement demanding an end to Israel’s blockade and the right for Palestinians to return to lands they fled or were expelled from when the Jewish state was founded.
The Hamas-backed weekly demonstrations, often violent, sputtered as Israel killed some 350 Palestinians in Gaza over more than a year.