Thousands of mourners laid yesterday (Saturday, May 14) to rest the body of a Palestinian teen, killed in Jerusalem by a settler. Milad Said Ayyash was fatally wounded on Friday as Palestinians across occupied East Jerusalem staged protests in the run-up to today’s anniversary of the Nakba.

The crowd marched from Ayyash’s home in the Ras Al-Amud neighborhood past a nearby Jewish-only settlement where Israeli security forces fired tear gas at stone-throwing youngsters in the crowd. There were reports of injuries and arrests.

The funeral of Milad Said Ayyash in Jerusalem (photo: Wafa News Agency)

Carrying Palestinian flags and the banner of President Mahmoud Abbas’ Fatah movement, the mourners, some of them masked, chanted “With our blood and our soul, we shall sacrifice for the martyr,” as they marched to the flashpoint Al-Aqsa Mosque in the Old City.

“This was murder”

A mourners’ tent was set up at the Ayyash family Ras al-Amoud home Saturday afternoon. “He was still a boy, just 17. He was and never participated in protests. The entire neighborhood loved him,” Said Ayyash, the teen’s father, told journalists.

“What happened (Friday) was murder. My son was intentionally murdered. The settlers and the forces guarding them used live rounds and hit him from five meters away. The Police and the Israeli government are responsible for the actions of the radical settlers that are squatting in the middle of our neighborhood. For the past two years the police are protecting the settlers,” he continued. “They say they are investigating, but they will not tell the truth. People who were there told me that after the shooting the police at Beit Yonatan used tear gas and wouldn’t let my wounded son be evacuated.”

Ayyash senior added that his son was only an observer in the protests and had nothing to do with stoning the security forces present. “The security officers in Beit Yonatan shot him at short range. The medical report said so. My son… never participated in demonstrations against the settlers, even it’s legitimate Palestinian resistance against the fact that the extreme-right Israeli government allowed settlers to come to Silwan,” he said. Said Ayyash works at the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research in Ramallah, where he translates Hebrew books into Arabic. “I hope my son becomes a symbol for the Palestinian people, to get rid of the Israeli occupation and the settlement in the middle of Silwan”.