Malek ‘Ali Ibrahim Hattab, 17, al-Jalazun Refugee Camp, Ramallah District, 14 April 2025

On 14 April 2025, soldiers fired from a second-floor balcony of a building on the main street of al-Jalazun Refugee Camp at a group of youths who were trying to flee from two military jeeps, after some youths threw stones at the jeeps. It is unknown whether Malek Hattab took part in the clashes. Hattab, 17, was shot in the abdomen. A woman who lives nearby tried to rescue him but was forced to retreat into her home after the soldiers also fired at her. Hattab was evacuated to al-Istishari Hospital in Ramallah, where he underwent surgery. He succumbed to his wounds several hours later, and the doctors pronounced him dead. Two other youths, one of them a minor, were also wounded by the gunfire.

B’Tselem field researcher Mohammad Romaneh collected the testimonies.

Hattab’s friend recounted on 25 April 2025:

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On Monday, 14 April 2025, at 12:25 A.M., I was with seven or eight of my friends around the market in the center of al-Jalazun R.C., north of Ramallah. We were sitting in a café, talking and playing cards. One of the friends was Malek Hattab, who was later shot by occupation soldiers and then died of his wounds.

At 12:30 A.M., social media posts said the army had entered the camp and was around the schools, near the Safi family home, next to the main road between Ramallah and Nablus, southeast of the camp. At the same time, the power in the camp went out.

Right after hearing about the army’s entry, we left the café and headed to where they said it was. When we got near the Safi family home, we didn’t see any soldiers, so we went back to the market area. The streets were very dark and almost empty.

I sat with Malek and the rest of the friends in the market area when two army vehicles suddenly appeared about 25 to 30 meters away from us. We didn’t hear or see them before they got close because their lights were off and everything around us was dark.

As soon as we noticed them, we ran away and scattered. After about five minutes, we met again in the Harat al-Qaysiya area, near the market, and then we saw the army vehicles’ lights were on, but I didn’t see any soldiers get out of them.

At that moment, some guys started throwing stones at the vehicles from about 30 to 35 meters away. The soldiers didn’t get out and didn’t shoot. After about five minutes, the vehicles started turning around, and we thought they were about to leave via the main road, so we went towards the Harat Jabineh/Dar Safi Street to throw stones at them as they withdrew.

It wasn’t until we’d advanced about 55 to 60 meters towards the main road and didn’t see the vehicles passing there that I realized they never left. While we were waiting for them there, we heard live fire, heavy and continuous, close to us. At first, I thought they were shooting from inside the vehicles, but when I tried to come out of the alley, two shots were fired at me, and then I realized the shooting was coming from the main road.

I had to climb over a wall that’s six to eight meters tall and jump down to the other side, and when I landed, I injured my legs and left arm.

After jumping, I noticed a person lying on the ground in the middle of the street, two to three meters away from me, trying to crawl while screaming in pain. I saw it was my friend Malek Hattab, but I didn’t dare go near him, fearing the soldiers would shoot me.

At the same time, the door of one of the houses opened, and a woman called to Malek to come closer, but then shots were fired towards the house, and she had to go back inside.

I tried to go to Malek to pull him away, but my injury made it very difficult, and the soldiers also fired at anyone who tried to get close. It took about 10 minutes before I was able to drag him, by his arm, to a nearby sheltered place. I turned him onto his back and saw that he’d been wounded in the abdomen. I took off his belt and shirt and tried to stop the bleeding, while shouting for help.

After about five minutes, the army withdrew, and the shooting stopped, and then we put Malek in a car that arrived at the scene and drove to al-Istishari Hospital, through Jifna. On the way, I heard him breathing heavily. I tried to wake him up, and he said: “Open the door, I’m suffocating,” and then he lost consciousness.

At the hospital, Malek was taken into the emergency room. The doctor said his condition was very serious and that he had severe internal bleeding. He underwent surgery for four hours, and then he was transferred to intensive care. At 10:30 P.M., the doctors announced he’d died of his wounds.

‘Abd al-Hakim Nakhleh, 62, a resident of al-Jalazun R.C., recounted on 16 April 2025:

I live alone in the al-Wakalah neighborhood in al-Jalazun R.C., on the main road, near the UNRWA office. My place is on the second floor of a three-story building. Underneath me there are storage rooms, and the third floor is unoccupied. My home has a balcony facing the camp’s main road.

On Monday, 14 April 2025, at 1:15 A.M., I woke up to gunfire in the camp, which sounded close to my house. I estimated that the sounds were coming from the direction of the main road. I heard something like 10 consecutive shots, and I didn’t hear any other sounds. I got up immediately and opened my bedroom window, which faces the main road, above al-Barakah supermarket, but I didn’t notice anything unusual.

At first, I thought the shooters were members of the Palestinian security forces, because there had been rumors that they were going to launch an operation against illegal vehicles, and they were in the village of Jifna, north of the camp, the day before.

After about 15 minutes, I got a call from a relative who told me that soldiers were on the second-floor balcony of my house, which faces the main road. When I asked him where this information came from, he said that local groups had reported it and that he had seen them on the balcony; then they went down the stairs and disappeared from his field of vision. At first, I didn’t dare go to the windows facing the balcony, for fear that they would see me, but in the end, after about half an hour, I went to the window, and the soldiers were no longer there.

At around 5:30 A.M., after the dawn prayer at the mosque, when I returned home, I checked around the house and discovered that the back gate was open, even though I always close it before going to sleep. I closed it and went to the balcony where I was told the soldiers had been seen. I found eight spent bullet casings on the floor there. That’s when I knew for sure that the army was on the balcony in the early hours of the morning. I collected them, took photos of them on my phone and then threw them away.

Later, I saw a video showing a boy lying on the ground in the alley opposite my balcony, where the soldiers had stood and where I found the casings from the shooting at Malek Hattab, who was killed, and the young men who were with him. I later found out that two other young men were also wounded by the gunfire.

Another al-Jalazun resident, who was in the area and was injured by the soldiers' fire, recounted on 16 April 2025:

On the night between 14 and 15 April 2025, at around midnight, while I was at my restaurant in the north of the camp, on the road between the camp and the village of Jifna, I found out through social media that an occupation army force had entered the camp from the south, through the area where the schools are located. At the same time, the power in the camp went out.

After about five minutes, news circulated on local residents’ social media groups that another force had entered the camp from the north, where the road leading down to Jifna is located. I closed the restaurant right away to go home because it’s also on the road down to Jifna.

I walked towards my house in the center of the camp. The street was dark because of the power outage. When I got to the market area in the center of the camp, I saw two army vehicles driving on the main road towards the center of the camp, so I took another route that passes by the mosque on the main road, about 100 meters from where the soldiers were.

On the way, I came across a group of about seven or eight young men, including Malek Hattab, who was later killed. They were standing, trying to figure out where to run and didn’t know which direction to turn, because there were conflicting reports about the soldiers’ location.

After about two minutes, posts on social media said that the army vehicles had stopped in the middle of the camp in the market area. We couldn’t see the area because buildings and shops blocked the view. We waited a bit near the mosque, and then we saw on social media that another force was advancing towards the market area, so we started advancing through one of the alleys towards Harat al-Qaysiya, about 75 to 80 meters from there.

After that, I went in the direction of the Jabineh neighborhood (or Harat Dar Safi), near the main road. There’s a wall around there that surrounds an empty lot, and I hid by it when I heard that the force was advancing.

At that moment, the power came back on for a few seconds and then went out again, and immediately after that, shots were fired towards us in Harat Dar Safi and towards other young men who were standing below, in the al-Qaysiya neighborhood.

When the shooting started, I felt that I’d been hit, and I fell to the ground, with my back towards the main road and my face towards the market. I saw the young men with me running toward the side street called Abu a-Sabuneh. I noticed that the gunfire was coming from the direction of the main road, but I didn’t see the soldiers.

The shooting continued, at first continuously and then intermittently, while I was lying there, unable to get up.

While I was lying on the ground, I heard someone shouting in Hebrew, “come,” and I thought the soldiers were coming towards me. I forced myself to get up and try to escape to a hidden alley, but I fell again and stayed there for about five to seven minutes, bleeding and afraid they would reach me and arrest me.

After that, a woman from the camp came, helped me get up and took me into her house. I stayed there for about 25 minutes, because it wasn’t possible to evacuate me to the hospital right away due to the soldiers’ presence. Afterward, two young men came, took me to a car and drove me through the lot area, where we came across an ambulance that took me to al-Istishari Hospital.

At the hospital, I was taken into the emergency room and sedated. When I woke up, I was told that Malek Hattab had been severely wounded in the abdomen by gunfire at the same time I was injured.

I had surgery on my right leg, and next week, I’m supposed to have surgery to implant a plate in the leg. The doctors found many fragments inside my body, including in my arms and legs.

That same day, the doctors announced that the boy Malek Hattab had died of his wounds after being hospitalized in intensive care for several hours.