JERUSALEM, Saturday, September 21, 2018 (WAFA) – Nasim Abu Roumi, 14, whose body was withheld by the Israeli army for more than one month and handed over to his family only yesterday, was laid to rest today in his hometown of Al-Eizariya, to the east of Jerusalem.

Hundreds of Palestinians took part in the funeral procession, which set off from his home in the town. They chanted slogans that condemned Israel forces’ extrajudicial killing of Palestinians.

Abu Roumi’s body was released by Israeli military yesterday and was handed over to the Palestinian Red Crescent, who handed the body over to his family. He was shot dead by Israeli forces in mid-August after he allegedly attempted to stab Israeli policemen inside the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound in Jerusalem.

The corpse of another slain Palestinian, Omar Awni Uounes, 21, from the village of Siniriya in the West Bank, was also handed over to his family yesterday after his body was withheld by Israeli forces for five months and buried in his village.

Israeli authorities hold corpses of Palestinians killed by Israeli forces in order to use them as a bargaining chip in any future prisoner exchange, as came in a recent Israeli Supreme Court ruling.

Corpses of dozens of Palestinians killed by Israeli forces since 2015 are still withheld in Israeli mortuaries despite calls by human rights groups on Israel to release them, and hundreds others killed since the 1967 occupation are buried in what is referred to as numbered cemeteries in undisclosed locations in Israel.

M.N./M.K.