BETHLEHEM, March 22, 2016 (WAFA) – Israeli forces Tuesday attacked Palestinian students in the town of al-Khader to the south of Bethlehem, with rubber-coated steel bullets, shooting and injuring a 14-year-old student in the foot.

Coordinator of the anti wall and settlements committee in al-Khader, Ahmad Salah, informed WAFA that armed Israeli soldiers attacked students as they were heading home from their schools, shooting and injuring a 14-year-old student in his foot. He was transferred to hospital for medical treatment.

The army reportedly deployed its troops across the town’s streets and alleys and began attacking and chasing down students, in order to secure an Israeli marathon that passed through bypass Road 60, south of the town, said the activist.

The Israeli violations practiced against the Palestinian educational process had notably increased in 2015, said the Palestinian Information Center.

Over the last year, ‘22 students and a Palestinian teacher were killed, in addition to one of the Ministry of Education‘s staff, while 265 students, teachers and employees of the ministry from the northern West Bank provinces were arrested, 75 students and 30 teachers were stopped and investigated by the IOF at checkpoints’, said the center.

T.R.