By Awad Rajoub

RAMALLAH, Palestine (AA): At least 50 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli forces since the start of this year, the Health Ministry said on Monday.

A ministry statement said the West Bank city of Jenin recorded the highest death toll with 17 fatalities and Nablus with seven deaths.

Only 14 Palestinians lost their lives to Israeli fire in the same period last year.

There was no comment from the Israeli authorities on the Palestinian statement.

In December, Israeli media reported that the military has authorized soldiers to open fire on stone-throwing Palestinians.

Tensions have been running high across Palestinian territories since last month amid repeated Israeli arrest campaigns in the occupied West Bank and daily settler incursions into the flashpoint Al-Aqsa Mosque complex in East Jerusalem.

Al-Aqsa Mosque is the world’s third-holiest site for Muslims. Jews call the area the “Temple Mount,” claiming it was the site of two Jewish temples in ancient times.

Israel occupied East Jerusalem, where Al-Aqsa is located, during the 1967 Arab-Israeli war. It annexed the entire city in 1980, in a move never recognized by the international community.

*Writing by Bassel Barakat in Ankara

[Photo: Israeli forces killed Palestinian youth,  Mo’tasem Mohammad Atallah, 18, near the illegal Israeli colonial settlement of Tuqu’, east of Bethlehem, in the occupied West Bank on 8 May. Photo by imemc.org]