The Israeli army today sealed off Huwara checkpoint, south of the occupied West Bank city of Nablus, according to local sources.
They said that the soldiers closed the checkpoint, located at the southern entrance to Nablus, to vehicles in both directions.
Meanwhile, the soldiers intercepted the funeral procession of a slain Palestinian whose body was released Thursday night after being withheld by the occupation authorities for 27 days.
The soldiers manning the Awarta checkpoint obstructed the funeral procession of Ammar Mifleh on its way to his hometown of Osarin village, south of Nablus.
Mifleh, 22, was killed by Israeli army gunfire on Friday, December 2, after being dropped to the ground in Huwara town.
A Video footage documenting the attack shows the soldier wrapping his arm around Mifleh’s neck and trying to drag him away before two Palestinians tried to intervene and de-escalate the situation.
Mifleh, who managed to get free from the soldier’s neck hold, wrestled with him for brief seconds before the soldier started removing his pistol out of its holster, his rifle fell in the process, and then he pushed the Palestinian, dropping him to the ground, before firing four rounds at him.
The soldier then approached Mifleh and before using his pistol to fire another round in a clear indication he executed the young man although he posed no threat, before picking up his rifle.
Eyewitnesses said the scuffle was fast and brief and that when the Palestinians seemed to have grabbed the muzzle area of the rifle, he was trying to ensure it wasn’t pointed at him.
Israeli severely restricts Palestinians’ freedom of movement within the occupied West Bank through a complex combination of approximately 500 fixed checkpoints, hundreds of flying checkpoints, settler-only roads, over 200 military bases and various other physical obstructions.
Closures besides to other measures, taken under the guise of security, are intended to entrench Israel’s 55-year-old military occupation of the West Bank and its settler colonial project which it enforces with routine and frequently deadly violence against Palestinians.
SOURCE: PALESTINE NEWS & INFO AGENCY