On Sunday, 29 October 2023, at around 2:00 A.M., soldiers drove into the center of Beit Rima, a village southwest of the town of Salfit. Some of them got out of the jeeps and stood next to the Abu Baker Mosque on the main road of the village. News of their presence spread on social media, and about 20 young men went to the area, gathered about 100 meters away from the soldiers and watched.
According to B’Tselem’s investigation, at around 2:45 A.M., some of the young men went towards a nearby building that is under construction. They immediately came under live fire from close range. The findings suggest they were shot by soldiers lying in ambush inside the building or nearby. Twelve of the young men sustained gunshot wounds. The soldiers drove off soon after, leaving the wounded men lying on the ground.
Village residents then came and took the wounded men to a hospital in Salfit, where one of them, Naser al-Barghouti, 29, who was shot in the abdomen, was pronounced dead. Two others who were seriously injured were transferred to other hospitals. The rest of the men were wounded in the lower body or the arms.
The military claimed that, “during activity the military initiated in Beit Rima, in the Efrayim Brigade, terrorists threw Molotov cocktails and explosives at the combatants, who responded with fire. Hits were detected.” However, B’Tselem’s investigation suggests the soldiers’ lethal fire came from an ambush they set up, not as a response to Molotov cocktails and explosives being thrown at them, and that the young men were not aware the soldiers were in the building, so they could not have thrown anything at them. On Sunday, 29 October 2023, at around 2:00 A.M., soldiers drove into the center of Beit Rima, a village southwest of the town of Salfit. Some of them got out of the jeeps and stood next to the Abu Baker Mosque on the main road of the village. News of their presence spread on social media, and about 20 young men went to the area, gathered about 100 meters away from the soldiers and watched.
According to B’Tselem’s investigation, at around 2:45 A.M., some of the young men went towards a nearby building that is under construction. They immediately came under live fire from close range. The findings suggest they were shot by soldiers lying in ambush inside the building or nearby. Twelve of the young men sustained gunshot wounds. The soldiers drove off soon after, leaving the wounded men lying on the ground.
Village residents then came and took the wounded men to a hospital in Salfit, where one of them, Naser al-Barghouti, 29, who was shot in the abdomen, was pronounced dead. Two others who were seriously injured were transferred to other hospitals. The rest of the men were wounded in the lower body or the arms.
The military claimed that, “during activity the military initiated in Beit Rima, in the Efrayim Brigade, terrorists threw Molotov cocktails and explosives at the combatants, who responded with fire. Hits were detected.” However, B’Tselem’s investigation suggests the soldiers’ lethal fire came from an ambush they set up, not as a response to Molotov cocktails and explosives being thrown at them, and that the young men were not aware the soldiers were in the building, so they could not have thrown anything at them.
B’Tselem field researcher Iyad Hadad collected testimonies from young men were injured in the incident:
A.K. said on 15 November 2023:
On Sunday, 29 October 2023, at around 2:30 A.M., I saw on social media that military forces had been in the neighboring village of a-Nabi Saleh and was heading to our village. I went out to see where they were. I met up with about 20 other young guys, between the ages of 18 and 25. We all headed towards the village clinic. When we got to the end of the street, we saw two military jeeps and a soldier transport vehicle driving along the main road, from the direction of a-Nabi Saleh. They stopped in front of the Abu Baker Mosque. We were 100 meters away from them. They were driving with their lights off. We didn’t see a single soldier get out of them. We found out only later that a group of soldiers did get out and set up an ambush.
We walked along the road behind the mosque and near the Mushref building, which is four or five stories high and still under construction. To the right of it, there’s an abandoned house and a pit. We saw one of the military jeeps driving towards the village square and turning around. I think they were trying to lure the young men into confronting them, but we ignored it and continued to look at the jeeps that were standing by the mosque. We were pretty far from the jeeps and there were no clashes, so we didn’t feel it was dangerous.
Naser al-Barghuti and I went back a few meters, while talking. Naser asked me: “What are we supposed to do?” Before I could answer, a volley of live shots was fired at us all of a sudden from the right, where the Mushref building and the abandoned house were, without warning. I saw Naser, who was the first one hit, fall down, and then other guys fell down and others were injured and tried to get away. Most of the guys who were with us were injured.
My first thought was to run away, but I only took two steps and was shot in the right hand. I wanted to keep running, but then I was hit in the left hand and fell. I saw a soldier come out of the ambush and walk towards me. There were at least five soldiers behind him. I’m not sure how many because it was dark. I gathered my strength, got up and tried to run away again, while they fired another volley at me and at everyone who was trying tried to escape. They also fired at the ones lying injured on the ground. I heard people screaming for help behind me. It was too terrible for words.
I kept running until I was about 120 to 150 meters away from them and hid around a corner, out of shooting range. I collapsed there, bleeding, and I tried to find where the injury was to stop the bleeding. I was in shock. My whole body was shaking. I didn’t know if I would survive or not. It was a strange and scary feeling, as if death was lurking for me.
A few minutes later, some guys reached me and took me to the hospital in Salfit. I heard Naser got there a few moments before me, and that he was dead on arrival. Some other guys who were injured with me arrived there, too. They were all hit by live bullets or fragments, mostly in the arms and legs. Later on, they transferred some of us to other hospitals like the Nablus Specialty Hospital or al-Istishari Hospital in Ramallah.
I was transferred to al-Istishari because they thought I would need surgery, but they did x-rays and tests there, and it turned out the bullets entered my body and exited and I had no fractures. So they treated me there and sent me home for further care and follow up.
M.B. said on 31 October 2023:
I got to the area of the intersection about 80 meters from the Abu Baker Mosque, which was where the military jeeps were. There were 15 to 20 young guys there already, and they told me the jeeps had driven around in the village before that. We stood to the left of the intersection, next to some land belonging to the Fallah family, so the Mushref building was to our right. We went ahead a little to see where the jeeps were and if any soldiers got out of them. We took only a few steps, up to the Mushref square, when suddenly we came under intense volleys of live fire. The soldiers were laying in ambush in the Mushref building, which is under construction.
No one saw them get there. They must have got out of the jeeps when they got to the mosque and then gone around it from behind, along the dirt road leading to the Mushref building, and set up an ambush there. They fired at us without warning and with no justification. There were no clashes, not even stone-throwing. They fired at us from the west, from maybe 10 meters away.
I was hit by several shots in the legs and thighs, and fell down. I couldn’t get up. I lay there screaming for help. There were eight or ten other guys next to me who were also hurt. Some managed to get a little further away, and some fell down on the spot, like Naser al-Barghuti, who was about two meters away from me. I heard him recite the Shahadatein and I repeated them after him. We all saw death before our eyes. I truly thought those were my last moments.
Some soldiers came up to us. Based on the green light from the sights on their rifles, I think there were about five of them. They looked at us, maybe to make sure we were hurt, and then walked towards their jeeps, got in and drove off. In the meantime, a lot of people from the village who heard the gunfire came over to us. They started evacuating us in their cars because there were no ambulances there and it was the middle of the night, so there was no point in waiting.
We were first taken to the hospital in Salfit, about 10 km from the village. Naser al-Barghuti was dying when he arrived. He was pronounced dead there.
I was hurt pretty badly. I had fractures in my leg, hip, and pelvis. Some blood vessels and tendons in my legs were severed. They only gave me first aid in Salfit and then transferred me to al-Istishari Hospital.
