PALESTINIAN ACTIVIST KILLED BY SETTLER IN WEST BANK, INQUIRY FINDS
Palestinian activist Awdah Hathaleen was shot dead by Israeli settler Yinon Levi on 28 July 2025 in the village of Umm al-Khair in Masafer Yatta, southern occupied West Bank, according to an investigation by Palestinian rights group Al-Haq released on the first anniversary of the killing. Hathaleen, a father of three who previously worked on the Oscar-winning documentary "No Other Land", was filming when armed settlers raided the village during land-levelling works for a new settlement outpost. The 31-year-old was shot once in the chest, causing fatal bleeding. Levi remains evading justice.
Al-Haq's investigation reviewed dozens of videos and photographs, cross-referenced legal testimony, and conducted geospatial and open-source analysis to reconstruct events. The autopsy found a single bullet caused Hathaleen's death, and the one-centimetre chest wound matched the nine-millimetre handgun Levi carried—an Israeli-manufactured firearm commonly used by Israeli settlers. At an Israeli court, Levi claimed no correlation existed between the shot he fired and Hathaleen's death. In court, Levi also claimed he acted in self-defence, but Al-Haq's evidence established no imminent threat; none of the Palestinians present was armed, and Hathaleen posed no danger when shot. The settlers had begun land-levelling work on what they expected to be designated land, but workers deviated from the planned route and entered privately owned land belonging to Umm al-Khair residents.
Hathaleen's death occurred amid escalating violence in the occupied West Bank. Over recent years, settler attacks have killed hundreds of Palestinians and displaced at least 45 communities since 2023, according to documented reports. Thousands of new settler housing units have been approved, and swaths of Palestinian territory declared "state land". Such incidents have disrupted Palestinians' access to emergency healthcare, with patients unable to reach dialysis treatment and women in labour prevented from reaching hospitals by military checkpoints and road closures.