A Palestinian was shot and killed on Tuesday in clashes with Israeli soldiers near a Jewish shrine in the West Bank town of Bethlehem, hospital officials said.
Abdullah Khaled Amarneh, 24, died after a bullet went through his back to his heart, hospital sources said.
Officials said that four Palestinians were also injured in the clashes near Rachel’s Tomb in the city.
AFP reported earlier that more than 35 Palestinians were injured Tuesday in clashes with Israeli troops in the West Bank and Gaza Strip on day 40 of the Palestinian Intifada (uprising) against Israeli occupation, medical sources said.
Twenty-six Palestinians were shot and wounded in confrontations in several hotspots in the Gaza Strip following the funeral of one of two Palestinians killed by Israeli troops the day before, hospital sources said.
Some 4,000 mourners attended the funeral of Mohammed Nawaf Al Taaban, 17, who was shot in the back Monday by Israeli soldiers guarding the Kfar Darom Jewish settlement south of Gaza City.
Another two were hit by rubber-coated steel bullets in confrontations at the northern entrance to the West Bank town of Ramallah, officials from the Palestinian Red Crescent organization said.
Several dozen Palestinians, including at one stage uniformed teenage schoolgirls, hurled stones from behind a barricade of overturned cars and burning tyres at Israeli soldiers who responded with a hail of rubber bullets and teargas, witnesses said.
Around 1,000 Palestinians took to the streets of Ramallah after calls by the main Palestinian political factions calling for marches across the occupied territories to mark the 40th day of unrest.
Witnesses also said Israel had sent in four tanks to the outskirts of the Arab village of Beit Sahur southeast of Bethlehem and reported that the army was setting up new posts on a bypass road for Jewish settlers near el-Khadr to west of the Palestinian-ruled town.
Some 500 demonstrators marched in the divided city of Hebron, some burning Israeli flags and chanting: "The Intifada will continue until independence,"
More than 184 people, most of them Palestinians, have been killed in the violence triggered by a September 28 visit by Israeli hardline opposition leader Ariel Sharon to a Jerusalem holy place that is at the heart of the conflict.
"Today on the occasion of 40 days since the beginning of the Intifada, the uprising should continue and be expanded to include the villages and the refugee camps," said a statement by the Palestinian national and Islamic fronts.
The statement, on behalf of all main factions including Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat's Fatah movement and the militant fundamentalist group Hamas, called for similar action on Friday and Sunday - GAZA STRIP (AFP)
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