RAMALLAH, July 24, 2018 (WAFA) – The killing of a Palestinian child by Israeli forces during a raid in Duheisha refugee camp in Bethlehem district and the death of a Palestinian youth from Israeli gunfire in Gaza dominated the front page headlines in Palestinian dailies on Tuesday.

Al-Ayyam and al-Hayat al-Jadida said that a Palestinian minor was killed by Israeli forces during a raid into Duheisha refugee camp, while a Palestinian young man succumbed to his wounds from Israeli gunfire, east of Khan Younes, in the southern besieged Gaza Strip.

Israeli forces killed Arkan Thaer Mezher, 15, with a live round in the chest and heart during a raid that clashes in Duheisha.

Karam Ibrahim Arafat succumbed to his wounds he had sustained from Israeli gunfire as he participated in the Great March of Return protests along Gaza’s eastern border.

Al-Quds added in this regard that thousands of Palestinians bid last farewell to Mezher and Arafat in Bethlehem and Khan Younes.

Highlighting other assaults, al-Ayyam said that Israeli forces detained two Palestinian minors from Deir Nidham village, northwest of Ramallah.

On the other hand, al-Quds opted to highlight a protest against the UN agency responsible for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, in Gaza city in its main news item.

Al-Quds and al-Ayyam reported in this regard that hundreds of UNRWA employees demonstrated outside the agency’s Gaza city office in protest of the agency’s plan to terminate the contracts of dozens of employees.

Al-Ayyam added that demonstrators called for the sacking of UNRWA Operations Director in Gaza Mathias Shamali.

Furthermore, the dailies reported that a large boulder fell from the Al-Buraq Wall, known as the Western or Wailing Wall for Jews, of East Jerusalem’s flashpoint Al-Aqsa Mosque compound.

Al-Hayat al-Jadida noted that the large boulder weighed 110 kilograms.

Al-Quds added that the Islamic Waqf Department called on the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) and Jordan to form a committee of experts to investigate the reasons of the collapse of the boulder.

Al-Ayyam and al-Hayat al-Jadida added that Muslim Waqf officials expressed concern over the possible collapse of other boulders as a result of Israeli excavations in the area.

Furthermore, the dailies reported President Mahmoud Abbas pledging to continue to pay the stipends of the families of Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails and those killed and injured by Israeli forces.

He was quoted in al-Quds and al-Hayat al-Jadida: “Even if we have only a penny left, we will spend it on the families of the martyrs and prisoners.”

He was also reported in al-Hayat al-Jadida stating: “We considers the martyrs and prisoners as stars in the sky of the Palestinian national struggle and they have preference in everything.”

Moreover, al-Quds reported that US President Donald Trump’s son-in-law and special advisor Jared Kushner and the US Middle East envoy Jason Greenblatt backed up on the decision to revive Gaza economy as a substitute for the so-called deal of the century.

Yet, al-Quds and al-Hayat al-Jadida spotlighted a conference jointly organized by the Palestine Liberation Organization’s Negotiations Affairs Department and Information Ministry on the political and legal implications of the Jewish Nation-State Basic Law.

Secretary-General of the PLO’s Executive Committee Saeb Erekat was reported in al-Hayat al-Jadida pledging to foil the so-called Jewish Nation-State Basic Law and submit a request to the UN General Assembly to question Israel’s right to maintain its membership in the international body.

Al-Quds added that the European Parliament has called on the European Union to exert pressure on Israel over the so-called Jewish Nation-State Basic Law.

According to al-Quds and al-Ayyam, Israeli police assaulted Palestinians who protested the demolition of a Palestinian-owned home in the northern Arab Israeli town of Sakhnin, seriously injuring a young man and moderately injuring an elderly women.

Al-Ayyam and al-Hayat al-Jadida reported the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra’as Al Hussein demanding that Israel immediately charge or release more than 400 detained Palestinian children.

It published a translation for AFP’s report titled US aid suspension hits Gaza’s poor.

K.F.