Forty children have been killed by Israeli forces in the West Bank in 2025, including a nine-year-old boy in Hebron governorate on 16 October, according to weekly Humanitarian Situation Updates on the West Bank by the United Nations agency.
Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) noted that between 14 and 20 October, Israeli forces killed three Palestinians, including one child, across the West Bank, including East Jerusalem. During the same period, 81 Palestinians, including 10 children and 11 women, and two Israeli soldiers were injured.
Of the injured Palestinians, 59 were injured by Israeli forces and 22 by Israeli settlers.
On 16 October, Israeli forces killed a nine-year-old Palestinian child in Ar Rihiya village, south of Hebron city, during a raid in which Israeli forces fired live ammunition and tear gas canisters at Palestinians, and Palestinians threw stones at the forces.
According to the UN Human Rights Office (OHCHR) in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT), the boy was shot by Israeli forces while playing football. According to Israeli media sources, the Israeli military has opened an investigation into the incident.
This fatality brings to 40 the number of Palestinian children killed by Israeli forces since the beginning of 2025 across the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, accounting for one in every five Palestinians killed during this period (40 children out of 198 Palestinians killed).
Since the beginning of the year, 65 Palestinians have been killed in Jenin governorate, the highest number among all governorates and representing about one-third of the 198 Palestinian fatalities in the West Bank so far in 2025.
According to OHCHR in OPT, between 7 October 2023 and 20 October 2025, 1,001 Palestinians, including 213 children (206 boys and seven girls), 20 women, and at least seven persons with disabilities, have been killed by Israeli forces and settlers across the West Bank, including East Jerusalem. This figure represents 43 per cent of all Palestinians killed in the West Bank over the past two decades.
The Office attributed most of these fatalities to “the systematic and excessive use of lethal force by Israeli forces, often involving live fire, airstrikes, and shoulder-fired missiles in densely populated areas, resulting in numerous civilian deaths, including children.”
It also reported that 331 of these killings raise serious concerns of extrajudicial executions, and in at least 244 cases, Israeli forces delayed or obstructed medical assistance to the injured. The report further highlighted that settler attacks have reached unprecedented levels, with 33 Palestinians, including three children, killed by settlers or by settlers and Israeli forces acting together. The Office noted that Israeli authorities have rarely initiated or concluded investigations into incidents involving the use of lethal force or settler violence, perpetuating a pattern of impunity and raising grave concerns about the protection of Palestinian civilians in the West Bank.
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