Israeli settlers forced a Palestinian family on Friday to exhume their father’s body from a cemetery in the occupied West Bank.
The settlers said the grave was too close to the recently re-established settlement of Sa-Nur, near Jenin, located around 300m from the burial site.
This was despite the family of Hussein Asasa reportedly obtaining the necessary Israeli permits to bury him there.
Shortly after the burial, settlers were seen digging at the cemetery, leading to confrontations with Palestinians in the area, according to Haaretz.
The Israeli army said it intervened to confiscate the settlers’ digging equipment.
CLICK FOLLOW: TO FOLLOW US
Sign up to get the latest insights and analysis on
Israel-Palestine, alongside Turkey Unpacked and other eSPORTY
The family said they were then forced to exhume the body and transfer it to another cemetery under Israeli military presence.
During the removal, settlers threw stones at the grieving family.
Ajith Sunghay, head of the UN human rights office in Palestine, condemned the incident.
“This is appalling and emblematic of the dehumanisation of Palestinians that we see unfolding across the OPT [Occupied Palestinian Territory],” Sunghay said.
“It spares no one, dead or alive.”
Violence by Israeli settlers against Palestinians has long been a feature of the occupied West Bank, but it has intensified sharply since the war on Gaza began in 2023.
Settlers now carry out near-daily attacks on Palestinian villages and communities, including vandalism, arson, forced displacement and physical assaults, sometimes involving firearms.
Last month, Israeli settlers shot dead two Palestinians, including a teenage student, during an attack on a school northeast of Ramallah.
According to the Palestinian Authority’s Colonization and Wall Resistance Commission, at least 50 Palestinians have been killed by settlers since October 2023, including 15 this year alone.
