16-year-old Rayan Mohammad AbdelQader Abu Mualla was shot and killed by Israeli forces. Photo courtesy of the Abu Mualla family.
Ramallah, December 22, 2025—Israeli forces killed a 16-year-old Palestinian boy in the northern occupied West Bank.
Rayan Mohammad AbdelQader Abu Mualla, 16, was shot and killed by Israeli forces around 7 p.m. on December 20 in the Palestinian town of Qabatiya, southwest of Jenin in the northern occupied West Bank, according to documentation collected by Defense for Children International – Palestine. Rayan was among a group of Palestinian boys and youths gathered in an alleyway east of the main road in the Al-Saba’na neighborhood, as military vehicles repeatedly drove back and forth along the neighborhood’s main road. Rayan and the others were not involved in any confrontation, but were unable to return home due to the presence of the military vehicle.
According to witnesses, the soldiers became aware of the youths trapped inside the alley. The military vehicle continued moving in the road before stopping at the end of it, about 200 meters from the alley’s entrance off the main road. Three soldiers then exited from the military vehicles.
The soldiers deliberately turned off the engine of the military vehicle, attempting to avoid alerting the youths that the forces withdrew from the area. Two soldiers then positioned themselves next to a wall located on the main street, which intersects with the entrance to the alley.
According to a circulated CCTV, Rayan exited the alley and began walking along the side road toward the main street. When he was about two meters (7 feet) from the main street, soldiers came out from behind a wall and fired at him at close range, striking him and causing him to fall to the ground.
Rayan left bleeding for 20 to 30 minutes while he was surrounded by the soldiers, who prevented the ambulance from approaching. The soldiers then placed Rayan inside a military vehicle, then left the area. The Ministry of Health announced the death of Rayan Abu Mualla at 8 p.m. and that his body was being held by the Israeli army.
Israeli forces entered Qabatiya around 6:30 p.m. with two heavily armored military vehicles and deployed in several neighborhoods, deliberately blaring their sirens and making noise disturbances. No clashes broke out in the town during the incursion. The forces withdrew from the town at around 7:30 p.m.
Due to the confiscation of Rayan’s body, DCIP is not able to verify the location or number of bullet wounds that he sustained.
Israeli forces and settlers have killed 56 Palestinian children in the occupied West Bank in 2025, according to documentation collected by DCIP.
Israeli forces have withheld the bodies of at least 63 Palestinian children since June 2016, according to documentation collected by DCIP. Six of the children’s bodies have since been released to their families, while 57 Palestinian children’s bodies remain withheld by Israeli authorities. Israel’s practice of withholding Palestinian bodies is a form of collective punishment, a flagrant violation of international humanitarian law, and deprives Palestinian families of the ability to lay their children to rest.
In September 2019, the Israeli Supreme Court approved the practice of confiscating human remains after several legal challenges to the policy. On November 27, 2019, Israeli Defense Minister Naftali Bennett ordered all bodies of Palestinians alleged to have attacked Israeli citizens or soldiers to be withheld and not returned to their families.
Decades of systemic impunity has created a situation where Israeli forces shoot to kill without limit. As Palestinian children are increasingly targets in the West Bank, Israeli forces’ rules of engagement seemingly allow direct targeting of Palestinian children where no threat exists to justify the use of intentional lethal force.