The death of a 14-year-old Israeli boy, Binyamin Achimair, who went missing while herding sheep on Friday and was discovered dead in the West Bank on Saturday, has been classified as a “terrorist attack” by Israeli authorities. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu condemned the murder in a statement, calling it a “serious crime.” The body of the teenager was found near the Malachei Shalom outpost, close to the city of Ramallah, after a drone spotted it. Israeli media reports state that he was not shot but did not specify how he was killed.
No group has claimed responsibility for the killing, but the discovery of Achimair’s body has led to increased violence by Israeli settlers in Palestinian villages. In a village near Achimair’s murder site, dozens of settlers set fire to 12 homes and several cars. The Palestinian Health Ministry confirmed that three people from the village were injured, one critically, while border police fired tear gas at villagers attempting to disperse them.
The violence began on Friday when Jewish settlers, who were part of the original manhunt, raided the village of Al-Mughayyir, located 500 meters west of Malachei Shalom. During the manhunt, the settlers fired shots and set numerous homes and cars in the village on fire. In response, residents threw stones at them. AFP reporters on site gave this account of the events.
The situation in the Israeli-occupied territories has been tense since the country’s war against Hamas began on October 7. The U.S.-designated terrorist group had attacked southern Israel, killing approximately 1,200 people and abducting over 240 hostages. Hamas is believed to still be holding approximately 100 hostages, as well as the remains of about 30 people who either died in captivity or were killed in the terror attack that triggered the war.
Israel’s retaliatory offensive in Gaza has killed over 33,000 people, according to the Hamas-run territory’s Health Ministry. The Israeli forces have razed large parts of the enclave, reducing it to rubble and causing most of Gaza’s population to flee. Over 1 million people are now sheltering in the southern border city of Rafah.
In the West Bank, over 460 Palestinians have been killed, mostly in skirmishes caused by army raids and vigilante Israeli settlers. The expanding Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank have turned the area into a powder keg. The international community overwhelmingly considers these settlements illegal, and Israeli outposts are not authorized there. However, consecutive Israeli governments have allowed sprawling Israeli settlement construction in east Jerusalem and the West Bank, which Palestinians stake as their future state.
Currently, over 700,000 Israelis live in the occupied West Bank and east Jerusalem, with the West Bank alone being home to around 490,000 Israeli settlers. The territories were seized by Israel in 1967. In response to the situation, Francesca Albanese, the United Nations special rapporteur on the rights situation in the Palestinian territories, has urged the U.N. to authorize the deployment of a protective presence in the occupied Palestinian territory, with the explicit mandate to prevent and repel attacks against civilians. She wrote about it on X.
