AL-MAZRA’A ASH-SHARQIYA, West Bank (AP) — The father of an American teen killed by Israeli fire in the occupied West Bank railed against Washington‘s military support for Israel, as hundreds of mourners buried the 17-year-old in the family’s ancestral Palestinian village Saturday.
The death of Tawfiq Ajaq on Friday drew an immediate expression of concern from the White House and a pledge from Israeli police to investigate.
It was the latest fatal shooting in the West Bank, where nearly 370 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli fire since the outbreak of the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza more than three months ago. The Biden administration has repeatedly expressed concern about violence by Israeli settlers against Palestinians in recent months.
During Saturday’s funeral, the teen’s father criticized the long-standing U.S. support for Israel. “They are killer machines,” he said of Israeli forces. “They are using our tax dollars in the U.S. to support the weapons to kill our own children.”
Tawfiq Ajaq was born and raised in Gretna, Louisiana, near New Orleans, relatives said. His parents brought him and his four siblings to the village of Al-Mazra’a Ash-Sharqiya last year so they could reconnect with Palestinian culture.
On Saturday, crowds of Palestinians pulsed through village streets, following men who held aloft a stretcher with the teen’s body, wrapped in a Palestinian flag.
Hafez Ajaq implored…
