Injured youth being evacuated; Photo credit: Free use
Sunday, August 10, 2025, 9:37 A border police officer who shot a 15-year-old Jewish youth in the back last week has not been removed from his duties. Honenu Attorney Eladi Weisel wrote letters to the Yehuda and Shomron District Border Police Commander and the Israel Police Commissioner demanding that the officer be immediately suspended, at least until the completion of the investigation. Additionally, Attorney Weisel wrote to the Police Investigation Unit demanding that they put the officer on trial for the shooting.
Attorney Weisel described the unfolding of events: The border police officer, who was driving a civilian vehicle, stopped next to a group of youths near Givat Asaf, adjacent to Beit El in the Binyamin region. The officer got out and opened fire on them without cause. “The youths, who thought that the officer had arrived to serve them with orders, turned around, intending to return to an open area. At the moment that the youths turned their backs on him, the officer cocked his weapon, an M16, and without any preliminary discussion, instruction or warning, opened fire on the youths with live rounds.”
The officer fired four rounds at them “calmly and in jarring silence. There was no legal justification for opening fire on the youths. The shots were illegal, lacking any justification or grounds.”
The incident did not end there. After the first barrage, the officer stepped away from the road, walked up to the mound where the youths had been standing, and “continued intensive fire at the youths’ backs as they were fleeing for their lives. He is estimated to have fired 15 additional rounds at the youths at this point, as they were running with their backs bent. They were like ducks in a shooting range.”
One of the rounds hit a minor, penetrated his lower back, split his spine, shattered vertebrae, damaged his lung tissue, and lodged in his left shoulder. The minor collapsed on the ground. The border police officer continued to shoot at the youths, even after they stopped running. Bullets continued to whistle past the injured youth, and he miraculously escaped additional injury.
The officer stopped shooting only after he approached the injured youth. However, he did not take any action to save the youth’s life, nor did he provide any medical first aid. The youth’s friends treated him until an ambulance arrived, and the EMT team rushed to evacuate him to the hospital. He underwent an emergency operation, and was hospitalized in the intensive care unit.
“The circumstances of the incident paint a disturbing and shocking picture of a border police officer who illegally opened fire on a minor. The unrestrained officer fired approximately 19 lethal rounds of live fire at a minor’s back, as the youth fled for his life, even after he already collapsed wounded and bleeding on the ground. The officer’s inconceivable behavior is not in accordance with any legal or ethical norm.”
Attorney Weisel added that the officer “used a lethal police weapon on an unarmed minor who had not committed any crime and did not pose a threat to anyone. There was no justification – and certainly no legal grounds – to open fire on him.
The officer “made lethal and illegal use of a firearm, callously disregarded open fire orders, and exhibited blatant and complete disrespect for human life. The incident ended with the serious injury of the minor and was only a step away from taking his life. The officer acted in an illegal and extremely unreasonable manner. An officer who allows himself to unjustifiably open lethal fire on a minor, is not suitable to serve in a public position in the State of Israel that grants him power, a weapon, and authority.”
The letter concludes with a demand for the immediate suspension of the border police officer: “In light of the egregious incident and the clear danger posed by leaving him in his position, we demand that the Yehuda and Shomron District Border Police Commander… announce the immediate dismissal of the offending officer from his duties. At the very least, he must be suspended until the end of the investigation against him.”