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Venezuela earthquakes aftershock hits near capital city as man rescued from rubble after being trapped for 106 hours – as it happened

The United States has pledged more than $300m in funding to aid earthquake-hit Venezuela, the state department said today, up from a previous commitment of $150m. “These funds will provide emergency medical care, food assistance, water and sanitation, shelter, protection, and logistics,” the department said in a statement. Venezuela’s acting president Delcy Rodríguez has posted footage of the rescuing of Aaron Levi Cantillo Vargas, 21, who she says was trapped under rubble in the town of Caraballeda for 106 hours before being pulled out to safety earlier today The president of Venezuela’s National Assembly has warned time is running out to rescue survivors trapped under the rubble. The death toll from the earthquakes has risen to at least 1,450 people, with 3,150 injured and 12,721 others displaced, Jorge Rodríguez said yesterday in a televised address. A 4.6-magnitude aftershock centred ⁠at ⁠a depth of 10km (six ⁠miles) hit north of the Venezuelan ⁠capital Caracas early ‌on ‌Monday, according to ‌the US Geological Survey. No damage was immediately reported from the ‌aftershock. US Marines are working to repair the Venezuelan port of La Guaira, a senior administration official said Monday, as Washington boosted its financial commitment for the earthquake-hit country to $300m. A “specialised team of Marines” are “working around the clock to repair that port and allow the delivery of critical supplies by sea,” the US official told journalists on condition of anonymity, adding that the USS Fort Lauderdale – an amphibious transport dock warship – had also docked there. Dilan Yeşilgöz-Zegerius, the Netherlands defence minister and deputy prime minister, said last night that the patrol vessel HNLMS Groningen was heading from the Caribbean to Venezuela to provide assistance to Venezuela following the earthquakes. In a post on X, she said the ship, which will deliver relief supplies, can provide and produce drinking water to affected areas in the country. The wife and two children of Argentine footballer Lucas Trejo have died after the powerful twin earthquakes struck Venezuela last week, his team said on Sunday. Trejo, who plays for Club Sport Maritimo La Guaira, a second-division team in Venezuela, had searched for his wife Yanina and children Aarón and Ainhoa in the rubble for three days before rescue workers recovered their bodies, CNN reported. China says it will send 100 million yuan ($14.7m; £11.1m) in disaster relief aid to Venezuela. The Chinese government will provide Venezuela with “emergency free relief supplies... to support earthquake relief and post-disaster reconstruction”, foreign ministry spokesperson Guo Jiakun told reporters this morning. All schools in Venezuela will remain closed until at least 6 June due to the extensive damage caused by the earthquakes that struck last week, the country’s education ministry has said. The government has urged families to follow official channels to keep informed about the latest developments.

Iran is jealously competing with Oman as decision-maker over strait of Hormuz

The strait of Hormuz is Iran’s chief bargaining tool in the negotiations with the US and so it was always likely to be the greatest point of contention. Every inch of the 24-mile-wide waterway is being contested in a test of wills and patience. For Iran, the continuation of the dispute is not a problem so long as it does not lose control. Under the memorandum of understanding signed with Washington on 18 June, substantive talks over Iran’s nuclear programme do not need to start until the lifting of the blockade of the strait – something Iran is required to use only “its best endeavours” to achieve. Moreover, the longer the blockade lasts, the closer come the US midterm elections for Trump. Iran’s government may yet find itself in a reckoning with its inflation-ravaged electorate but no date for that is fixed. Iran is adopting a maximalist interpretation of the memorandum, decreeing that it alone can lift the blockade. Jealously guarding this prerogative, it has been resisting the involvement of any other country or institution in opening the strait. For that reason, Iran rejected the suggestion of a southern route close to the coast of Oman developed with the UN’s International Maritime Organization. The idea was that, as the central route through the strait had been closed because of mines, two new shipping lanes could be opened, one in Omani waters overseen by the US Joint Maritime Information Center, and one farther north close to Iran. The IMO thought it had Iran’s agreement for the proposal. But either different parts of the Iranian regime adopted different positions or the IMO misunderstood Iran’s flexibility. Either way the Iranian attack on a Singaporean ship passing through the southern route on Thursday led the IMO to abandon the plan. For Iran, losing the strait card would mean returning to negotiations on prewar terms and losing an important strategic tool. At a news conference in Baghdad the Iranian foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, said: “Any attempt to adopt new or separate arrangements from those currently being pursued by the Islamic Republic will only lead to further complications, delays in reopening the strait of Hormuz and an increase in tensions.” But the row over the southern route – likely to be discussed in talks in Doha – has the potential to overshadow the search for a long-term solution to the management of the strait – a solution that has been worked up in considerable legal detail by Oman over the past two months. The plan has been crafted with the aim of meeting the requirements of international law and also securing Iran’s eventual support. But Oman, a neutral nation by temperament and practice, is in a delicate diplomat spot. It knows that if it ignores Iran’s objections, Tehran is less likely to agree to Oman’s plan for the future of the strait. But if Oman does not take the initiative in helping the humanitarian operation to release thousands of trapped sailors, the less likely it is that its proposals for the strait will be accepted by the region or by the UN – and the more likely it is the US will return to all-out war. The very fact that Iran’s deputy foreign minister, Kazem Gharibabadi, held joint discussions in Muscat with Oman’s minister of state for foreign affairs, Abdulaziz al-Hinai, is a tacit acknowledgment by Tehran that it does not have sole decision-making powers in the strait’s future management. What Oman has tried to do is construct a management system that will ensure littoral states receive income from commercial shipping passing through the strait but the income would come as much as possible in the voluntary contributions, or payments for specific navigational services made by trade groups, ships or states. The Omani foreign minister, Badr al-Busaidi, explained: “We are not in favour of imposing tolls on passage through the strait of Hormuz, which is prohibited internationally – whereas service fees are legal, and discussions are currently under way with the Iranian side concerning them.” It is a distinction with a difference, and one that has been developed with some of the best UK commercial legal advice. Article 26 of the law of the sea expressly forbids payment for mere passage but article 43 permits user states and strait states to fund cooperatively the provision of maritime services, including a port call or service used. This point will have been made by the sultan of Oman during his meeting with the French president, Emmanuel Macron, on Monday. In theory, Macron and the UK prime minister, Keir Starmer, have a naval taskforce ready to set sail to police an agreement on freedom of navigation. The sultan is likely to have argued that if the west adopts Oman’s plan, there will be no need for such a force.

Trump claims Iran has agreed to hold peace talks in Doha after recent clashes

Donald Trump has claimed that Iran has agreed to hold talks in Doha after the US and Iran traded fire in the strait of Hormuz this weekend, threatening the collapse of a ceasefire meant to keep the strait open and pave the way for peace talks. In a terse post on Truth Social, the US president claimed that the meetings would take place in the Qatari capital, as US media reported that the two sides had agreed to halt strikes following tit-for-tat attacks that once again cut off shipping through the crucial waterway. “IRAN HAS REQUESTED A MEETING. IT WILL TAKE PLACE TOMORROW IN DOHA! President DJT,” Trump wrote in all capital letters. The announcement came after Iran on Saturday targeted a cargo ship in the strait of Hormuz in a drone attack, leading US Central Command (Centcom) to launch retaliatory strikes against Iranian “military surveillance infrastructure, communication systems, air defense sites, drone storage facilities and minelayer capabilities”. Iran’s Islamic ⁠Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) then said on Sunday it ⁠had launched a joint missile and drone ⁠operation targeting eight US military ‌sites in ‌Kuwait and Bahrain. With the deal faltering, the White House stepped in to seek an off-ramp from the resuming hostilities, even as the specifics of who will hold control over the strait of Hormuz and whether Iran can charge fees for passage in the future remains unclear. The White House spokeswoman, Karoline Leavitt, told Fox News that a US delegation to Doha would include Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff and his son-in-law Jared Kushner. Iranian negotiators are expected to meet them there. Axios, a US website, reported that the talks would also include “technical teams” meant to discuss Iran’s nuclear programme, indicating that pre-planned negotiations may now focus on how to prevent a return to open conflict between the US and Iran. Vice-President JD Vance last week credited new high-level contacts with the Iranian government with preventing a new outbreak of violence in the region. A US official told Axios that the US had “decided to stop all the kinetic activity”, meaning strikes against Iran, in advance of the talks.

Five people killed in shooting in northern Germany, police say – Europe live

… and on that note, it’s a wrap for today! Five people – four women and one man – have been killed in a shooting at a youth welfare facility ⁠in a northern German town of Stade. One person died later from their injuries at a hospital. Two people – unofficially identified by the German media as a man and a woman, both 21-year-old – remain in police custody in connection with the shooting. There is an unknown number of people injured, some seriously, with concerns that the death toll could rise further in the coming hours. The motive for the shooting and the circumstances surrounding the incident remain unclear at this stage. A further press conference is scheduled for 7.30pm local time. Separately, Extreme temperatures continue to affect large parts of central and eastern Europe, with at least 130 million people expected to experience temperatures of 35C and above today, AFP estimates said (11:50). Albania, Bosnia, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, and Serbia are among the countries most affected today, with temperatures up to 40C. If you have any tips, comments or suggestions, email me at jakub.krupa@theguardian.com. I am also on Bluesky at @jakubkrupa.bsky.social and on X at @jakubkrupa.

Sydney to get parking zones for shared ebikes in bid to stop ‘wild west scenes’ of blocked footpaths

Shared ebikes cluttering Sydney footpaths will be kicked to the kerb in the coming months under funding to establish marked parking bays, the New South Wales government says. On Tuesday, the state government announced $6.6m in funding for Sydney local councils to nominate and paint dedicated parking areas. Each council will be given up to $200,000. Operators are paying for the Sharing Scheme Grant Program through a 60 cent fee on each shared ebike trip. When the program was first announced last year, operators including Lime suggested the levy would probably be integrated into existing management fees for ebike users. The number of shared ebikes in Australia has quadrupled in less than two years, with the vast majority in Sydney. The city’s ebike fleet has surged from 13,000 in January to more than 20,000 in May, according to Transport for NSW. Sign up for the Breaking News Australia email The NSW transport minister, John Graham, said while the growth of shared schemes was a positive development, “we are not willing to stand around and let the wild west scenes … go on any longer”. “Pedestrians have been crying out for order and for their footpaths back.” The government says the funding is for the 16 councils which now host shared e-bike schemes, to deliver marked bays on streets and kerbside zones “in the areas of most conflict and complaint”. The scheme was announced last year alongside expanded powers for LGAs, which will be rolled out progressively in the coming months. Councils can decide “no-go’” and “go-slow” zones for shared and private ebikes, and penalise shared ebike operators if parking areas aren’t used, with a maximum penalty of $55,000 plus $5,500 for each day the offence continues. Multiple councils have already piloted shared parking schemes, including the City of Sydney, North Sydney and Waverley. Transport for NSW has trialled parking zones at nine train and metro stations around Sydney, with space for about 190 ebikes. The transport secretary, Josh Murray, said the agency was accelerating its own rollout of bays at other transport hubs and stations. “We’re aiming to have 250 bays available by late this year, with 62 already in delivery,” he said. The government said its trial pointed to marked bays reducing kicked-over bikes and blocked footpaths by half. The changes are part of a safety crackdown on shared and private ebikes amid a surge in injuries and come after an incident earlier this year when dozens of ebikes swarmed the Sydney Harbour Bridge. The government has given authorities powers to seize and crush private ebikes operating at speeds more than 25km/h, but has yet to decide on a minimum age to ride an ebike.

Pakistani airstrikes kill dozens in eastern Afghanistan

Pakistani airstrikes in three eastern provinces of Afghanistan killed 36 civilians and wounded 163 others, Afghan officials have said, as attacks between the two countries showed no sign of abating. Pakistan’s information minister, Attaullah Tarar, said the operations on Sunday night were aimed at a terrorist group his country blamed for a deadly militant attack in Karachi that killed three security personnel over the weekend. Tarar said Pakistani security forces had carried out an “intelligence-based ground operation” followed by airstrikes along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border targeting terrorist hideouts over the border. Afghan authorities have repeatedly denied that their territory harbours militants. Hamdullah Fitrat, a spokesperson for Afghanistan’s Taliban government, said Pakistani forces targeted a home in the Chamkani district of Paktia province, killing an older man and a child and wounding other family members. When residents gathered to rescue people, the area was struck again, killing 28 villagers and wounding 158, he said. Six people, mostly women and children, were killed when a home was struck in a village in Giyan district, Paktika province, Fitrat said. A civilian home in Kunar province was also hit, causing no casualties but killing 30 livestock. Another Taliban spokesperson, Zabihullah Mujahid, condemned the military action as a “cowardly act of aggression”. The strikes are the latest flare-up of violence between the two countries, whose relationship has been fraught since the Taliban government took power in 2021, and follow a weeks-long war that erupted in February. On Saturday, militants armed with guns and explosives targeted the regional headquarters of the paramilitary Pakistan Rangers in Karachi, killing three soldiers. Security forces killed three attackers and arrested a wounded assailant, whom the military identified as an Afghan national. Jamaat-ul-Ahrar, a breakaway faction of the Pakistani Taliban, claimed responsibility for the Karachi attack in a statement on Saturday night. Tarar said Pakistan’s latest operation along the Afghan border targeted the hideouts and safe havens of Jamaat-ul-Ahrar and Fitna al-Khawarij, a term Pakistan uses for the Pakistani Taliban. “Pakistan has always strived for maintaining peace and stability in the region, but at the same time shall not compromise on the safety and security of our citizens, which remains our top priority,” Tarar said. Pakistan has seen a surge in militant attacks targeting police and security forces in recent years. Authorities have blamed the Pakistani Taliban, also known as Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan, or TTP, and allied militant groups for most of the violence. The TTP is a separate militant group from the Afghan Taliban, although the two are allies. The countries agreed to a ceasefire in March but there have been sporadic attacks since, with Pakistani strikes in June killing 13 people, according to Afghan officials. As Islamabad mediates between the US and Iran to end their war in the Middle East, Pakistan says its battle against militancy at home requires its strikes on Afghanistan. Afghan authorities say Pakistani operations have caused a heavy civilian death toll, including a strike at a drug treatment centre in March that the UN said killed hundreds. The conflict has included fierce fighting along the frontier and unprecedented Pakistani airstrikes on Afghan cities including the capital, Kabul, and Kandahar, where the Taliban supreme leader is based. Mediation from several countries including China and Saudi Arabia has failed to produce a lasting resolution and the frontier has been largely closed since cross-border violence in October. In early March, Pakistan’s army chief, Field Marshal Asim Munir, said peace between Pakistan and Afghanistan could prevail only if the Taliban regime “renounced their support for terrorism and terrorist organisations”. With Agence France-Presse and the Associated Press

Escalating US-Iran strikes threaten interim peace agreement

A new round of escalating strikes between Iran and the US has continued, further undermining the fragile interim peace agreement between the two countries, and prompting Donald Trump to threaten violence that would ensure Iran “will no longer exist”. On Sunday, Tehran launched drone and missile attacks against Bahrain and Kuwait after new US strikes on sites in southern Iran, and threatened a “complete halt” to negotiations to end the war. Trump said that a moment might come soon when he abandoned talks and the US would “militarily finish the job”. The US president posted on social media: “If that happens, the Islamic Republic of Iran will no longer exist!” Earlier on Sunday, Kuwait, which hosts a major US army base, said it had intercepted two ballistic missiles and that there were no reports of injuries or damage, while Bahrain’s interior ministry said the Iranian strikes had damaged a residential building near the international airport and that no one had been killed. Qatar’s interior ministry ⁠said one Qatari national had been killed and second person injured by shrapnel from “military operations ⁠in the area”. The two were on a boat that went missing on Saturday and was located early on Sunday. The ministry did not give the location of the incident and did not ⁠say whether the shrapnel was linked to the Iranian drone attacks. But late on Sunday a US official said both sides had agreed to halt recent hostilities and renew talks on the strait of Hormuz. “Technical talks are slated to continue on all areas of the MOU. Both sides will stand down for now and vessels can move freely,” the official said, referring to the 14-point memorandum of understanding that was ⁠agreed earlier this month and under which the strait would be re-opened for traffic. The latest violence has been triggered by efforts to reopen the strait of Hormuz to all shipping without Iran’s direct oversight. The strategically critical waterway, which carried a fifth of the world’s oil and liquid gas supplies before the war, has long been considered an international passageway. US Central Command said in a statement that its strikes were “in direct response to continued Iranian aggression against commercial shipping” and had targeted Iranian military surveillance, communications, air defence, drone storage and mine-laying facilities. Washington has been promoting a southern lane along the coast of Oman, while Tehran, which ultimately aims to charge fees for use of the strait, wants ships to ‌use a northern route through its waters and under its control. Hundreds of vessels, including tankers laden with oil, have been blockaded inside the Gulf by the closure of the strait since war broke out. Some have chanced the passage through the past two weeks, leading oil prices to drop to close to prewar levels and bringing relief to economies around the world. The US military accused Iran of violating the ceasefire on Saturday by attacking the Panama-flagged tanker Kiku, which carried crude oil for the state-run energy company of Qatar. According to ship-tracking websites, the Kiku appeared to be attempting to use the southern corridor near the coast of Oman. A Singapore-flagged container ship was struck by an Iranian drone while transiting the same route last week. Abbas Araghchi, Iran’s foreign minister, restated Tehran’s claim to sole control of the waterway during a state visit to Iraq on Sunday. He said in Baghdad: “Any interference in this matter, any attempt to establish new or separate arrangements from those currently being carried out by the Islamic Republic of Iran, will only lead to further complications, delay the reopening of the strait of Hormuz, and increase the level of tension.” Observers say Iran is using its ability to threaten shipping in the strait not just as leverage in negotiations with the US, but to intimidate neighbouring countries and establish a more dominant role in the region. Aragchi also called for the establishment of a security framework with Gulf countries that would exclude the US. He said: “We should reach a new framework that includes all countries in the region and without the presence or interference of any country from outside the region.” Mediators from Qatar and Pakistan successfully brought representatives of Washington and Tehran together in Switzerland earlier this month but have been unable to bridge wide gaps on contentious issues such as the future of the strait of Hormuz, sanctions relief for Tehran, and the future of Iran’s nuclear programme. Under the memorandum of understanding signed earlier this month, the two countries have 60 days to work out the details before signing a final agreement. Leaders in Tehran and Washington face domestic political pressures to avoid a return to conflict and appear committed to a ceasefire for now, despite frequent bellicose rhetoric. The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps claimed responsibility for both new attacks on Sunday. It said: “Let the enemy know that violating the ceasefire … will lead to a complete halt of ongoing processes.” The IRGC, which controls Iran’s ballistic missile arsenal, has gained influence in Iran in recent months. Its navy command said American bases in the region would “experience hell in the coming days”. Bahrain’s foreign ministry denounced the attacks, which it called “a dangerous escalation that reveals that what Tehran is doing is not a passing act, nor an isolated incident, but rather a deliberate approach and a systematic pattern of repeated aggression against the sovereignty of the kingdom, and the security of its citizens and residents”. Bahrain is home to the US navy’s 5th Fleet, whose base there came under repeated attack during the war. Violence has also continued in Lebanon, further threatening the agreement between Iran and the US to end their own conflict. Israeli military officials said a soldier had been killed on Sunday when soldiers encountered a “Hezbollah terrorist after entering a suspicious structure in the area of Deir Seryan in southern Lebanon”. The Lebanese state news agency reported a new Israeli attack targeting the outskirts of the towns of Deir Seryan and Taybeh in southern Lebanon. The fresh clashes in Lebanon come two days after Israel and Lebanon signed an agreement aimed at ending hostilities. The deal calls for Israeli forces to begin an initial withdrawal from the south of the country and their replacement by the Lebanese armed forces who will assume responsibility for local security and dismantling the military infrastructure of Hezbollah. They will also further undermine prospects for any durable peace agreement between Iran and the US, which Tehran has insisted is dependent on a ceasefire in Lebanon. Israel, which is not a party to the US deal with Iran, invaded southern Lebanon in March in a new offensive against Hezbollah, which is supported by Iran. Israel and Lebanon have repeatedly agreed to US-brokered ceasefires, the latest on Friday, but these have had only limited effect, with Israel insisting it will not withdraw from Lebanese territory it has seized, and Hezbollah repeatedly rejecting calls to give up its arms as long as Israeli troops remain in place. With reporting by Reuters and Associated Press

How children in West Bank are being killed by Israel ‘without accountability’

On the day he died, Mohammad al-Halaq had been jubilant about a new school bag he had been given in class, printed with the logo of the UN child protection and advocacy agency, Unicef. “He was extremely happy. It was something out of the ordinary for him to be given a bag,” recalled his mother, Aliyah. “He came knocking on the door to tell me had this new bag to put pencils and pens in.” The nine-year-old ran home then raced back to school to ask, unsuccessfully, if he could get another bag for his brother. After lunch, he went outdoors to try to catch birds in a net he had rigged up. He caught one and showed it off to his friends. Full of energy, he then wanted to go to his grandparents’ house nearby. The al-Halaq family live in ar-Rihiya, in the hills south of Hebron, which have become notorious for Israeli settler violence abetted by an increasingly politicised army. So Aliyah was nervous about Mohammad going anywhere out of her sight, but she had to go to the shops and her son was determined, waving goodbye to her as he sprinted away. It was the last time she saw him alive. Mohammad was shot in the pelvis by an Israeli soldier at about 4pm that day, 16 October last year. He had been playing football with other boys in a school playground when two army Jeeps drove up. The boys scattered in all directions. By one account, a couple of the older teens threw stones towards the Jeeps, while others shouted at the soldiers once they had reached what they thought was a safe distance. A video shows a soldier get out of the Jeep and aim his rifle towards the hilltop where some of the boys were watching. Shots were fired and Mohammad took a couple of steps before collapsing. Others tried to reach the bleeding boy but were held back by more shots and teargas fired by the soldiers below. Aliyah was at the shops when the call came. It was her uncle calling her father, but she had an instinct and grabbed her father’s mobile. “I asked him directly: ‘Is it my son Mohammad? Please tell me the truth. Is it my son?’ And he hung up when he realised it was me,” Aliyah said. Mohammad died in hospital, one of 235 Palestinian children and teenagers killed by Israeli forces on the West Bank – plus another five killed by settlers themselves – since 7 October 2023. That date marked the start of the Gaza war, triggered by a Hamas attack on southern Israel which killed about 1,200 Israelis (of which about 800 were civilians and 38 were children). The reprisals were not just against Gaza, where more than 72,000 Palestinians have been killed (21,000 of them children), but also in the West Bank, where military rules of engagements have been loosened and impunity is the norm. “The widespread and unprecedented killing of Palestinian children and teenagers in the West Bank is the result of Israel’s broader policy that allows the killing of Palestinians without accountability,” said Yuli Novak, the executive director of the human rights group B’Tselem, which published a report on Monday titled Unshielded Childhood. It focuses on 54 Palestinian children and teenagers killed by Israeli forces in 2025 alone. “The system does not merely back the shooters – it effectively gives them a licence to kill,” Novak said, pointing to recent remarks by Maj Gen Avi Bluth, the head of the army’s central command, deployed in the West Bank, claiming “we are killing like we haven’t killed since 1967”. Bluth also claimed that “96% of those killed were involved in terrorism”, but B’Tselem called that a “blatant lie”. Its analysis of the minors killed in 2025 found no evidence that any of them posed any threat, or were members of any militant group. A spokesperson for the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said that the army did not “intentionally target uninvolved civilians”. “Every allegation of harm to uninvolved individuals is examined and investigated,” the spokesperson said. “The IDF and Israel’s security forces will continue to operate to thwart terrorism and protect the citizens of Israel, while remaining committed to Israeli and international law and taking measures to mitigate harm to civilians whenever possible.” According to data from another human rights organisation, Yesh Din, no Israeli has been indicted for the killing of a Palestinian since October 2023. In a separate report last week, a UN independent international commission of inquiry found that: “Israeli authorities and security forces have deliberately targeted Palestinian children resulting in genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes in the Gaza Strip and war crimes in the West Bank.” “The evidence shows that Palestinian children have been deliberately targeted and killed by the Israeli security forces,” said Srinivasan Muralidhar, chair of the commission. Even after the partly observed Gaza ceasefire last October, Muralidhar said, “children continue to be killed and seriously injured, with continued disregard by Israel for the ceasefire and for the protection owed to Palestinian children under international law”. Rimas Amuri was 13 when she was shot just outside her family home in the Jenin refugee camp in February last year. It was a Friday and she was playing with cousins outside. There was no sign of any security alert, and traffic was passing normally. Her father, Omar, said the family live close to a military checkpoint in an area which is normally considered secure. “We were just living our life normally. If I had known that something was wrong, I would never give my daughter permission to go to play outside.” The IDF told Haaretz after the shooting that its soldiers “identified a suspicious figure moving near forces operating in the area. The troops initiated a suspect-arrest procedure, which included calling out to the figure. When she failed to respond, they fired at her lower body.” B’Tselem’s investigation found that at 40 metres’ range, the soldiers should have been able to see Rimas was a young girl. None of the witnesses heard any warning calls, and according to the medical report, “Rimas was shot in the back, suggesting she may not have been aware of the soldiers’ presence at all”. Military police questioned witnesses but the family have heard nothing of any inquiry. “If such a thing has happened with an Israeli girl, what would the reaction be?” Omar Amuri asked. “We are against the killing of anyone. We are the same like every other person.” The majority of the children killed in the West Bank were playing outside when they lost their lives. But two-year-old Layla al-Khatib was inside her family home sitting in her mother’s lap when an Israeli soldier shot her in the head in January last year. The 25-year-old mother, Taymaa, is still too traumatised to speak. Her father, Bassam, Layla’s grandfather, said the family was sitting down to a Saturday evening meal in the second-floor flat in Muthallath a-Shuhada, near Jenin, when they heard a commotion in the nearby streets. Israeli soldiers had arrived in the neighbourhood in three civilian vehicles with Palestinian licence plates, and commandeered a building near the al-Khatib flat. Such incursions are commonplace and the family carried on eating until suddenly the gunfire was frighteningly close. “My wife and I threw ourselves to the floor, and then I heard our daughters screaming and they kept shouting Layla’s name,” Bassam recalled. He went into the bedroom where his daughters had sought refuge and took Layla in his hands carrying her out on the street where he found the house surrounded by soldiers. “I asked the officer there: ‘Why did you fire on us? Why did you kill my granddaughter? ‘The officer called one of the soldiers to give her first aid. The soldier said: ‘I can’t help her,’ so the officer said they would call an ambulance. That took about 15 minutes.” Layla was pronounced dead at the hospital. “This is a small example of what is happening to our people,” Bassam said. “What is the aim of this? Is it an aim of the Israeli government to kill our children? Please let Layla’s story mark an end to the killing of more children and killing humanity.” An IDF spokesperson said the al-Halaq, Amuri and al-Khatib cases were “currently under investigation by the Military Police Criminal Investigation Division”. “Upon completion of the investigations, the findings will be submitted to the military advocate general’s corps for review,” the spokesperson said, adding that “vast majority of Palestinians killed by IDF troops were involved in terrorist activity”. A military spokesperson added: “In recent years, armed terrorist cells have developed in Palestinian cities and camps, carrying out and facilitating numerous attacks against Israeli civilians. Since 2023, and even more intensively following 7 October, the IDF has been operating extensively to dismantle these terror cells through targeted counter-terrorism operations, and the elimination of armed and wanted terrorists.”