WORLD
While the world’s eyes are on Gaza, Palestinians see a land grab underway in the West Bank

"They are taking advantage of the war and the current status quo," said a Palestinian woman who says her son-in-law was killed by an Israeli settler.

Aug. 17, 2024, 5:25 AM EDT
By Hala Gorani, Corky Siemaszko and Briony Sowden

Not long after Hamas launched the Oct. 7 terrorist attack on Israel and sparked the now 10-month war in the Gaza Strip, another killing was reported in the occupied West Bank.

A 40-year-old Palestinian street vendor and farmer named Bilal Saleh was harvesting olives on his family's small plot of land when, according to his family, he was fatally shot in the chest by an Israeli who lives in one of the Jewish settlements that ring Al-Sawiya.

And 10 months later, the family says, they’re not sure if Israeli officials are even investigating Saleh’s death. An Israeli soldier was briefly detained after the killing and later released.

“We can’t confirm if it is true or not that they apprehended” the man accused of killing Saleh, his mother-in-law, Mona Saleh, told NBC News in July when she ventured into Al-Sawiya, an ancient Palestinian village. “I don’t think they detained him, even if they arrested him. If they took him, it was for his safety.”

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