Report: US Activist Was Killed by IDF After Retreating

In admitting one of its soldiers likely killed Aysenur Eygi, a US-Turkish citizen, Israel's military said the activist was "hit indirectly and unintentionally by fire which was not aimed at her," but at the "key instigator" of a "violent riot" in the West Bank. Yet video and witness reports indicate the International Solidarity Movement volunteer was shot in the head more than 30 minutes after "the height of confrontations" between Israeli forces and protesters pushing back against the expansion of Israeli settlements, and 20 minutes after protesters had retreated to a location more than 200 yards from where Israeli soldiers were positioned on a roof, the Washington Post reports.

A fellow activist who accompanied Eygi said the 26-year-old was nervous to be attending her first West Bank demonstration and chose to stay away from the action. When shots rang out, the pair retreated down a hillside to an olive grove, where they hid behind trees, the woman said. The Post describes 20 minutes of calm during which the protesters "posed no apparent threat." Then soldiers fired two to three rounds, the activist said. Eygi fell to the ground, blood pouring from her head. A Palestinian teenager standing about 20 yards from Eygi was wounded. The IDF failed to identify the "instigator" and declined to say whether the 17-year-old was a target.

New Jersey teacher Daniel Santiago, who was shot in the thigh in Beita last month, tells the Post that soldiers use "live ammunition" on protesters "every week." On the same day Eygi was killed, soldiers allegedly shot and killed a 13-year-old girl in her West Bank village, per the Post. President Biden said Wednesday that Eygi's death was "totally unacceptable" and that "Israel must do more to ensure that incidents like this never happen again," but he also noted Israel's preliminary finding indicated the death "was the result of a tragic error." Turkey's Foreign Ministry, on the other hand, echoed Eygi's own family, saying the activist was murdered by Israel's government and the country would work to bring those responsible to justice. (More Israel stories.)