Tear Gas Assault on Palestinian Children in West Bank Signals Escalation of Israeli Tactics
Israeli occupation forces fired tear gas canisters at Palestinian children in the village of Al-Fakhit, east of Yatta, near Hebron in the occupied West Bank. The New Arab reported the incident, noting that children suffered from tear gas inhalation during the unprovoked assault. Mainstream outlets, like The Times of Israel, frequently frame such incidents as 'clashes' or 'security operations,'
obscuring the reality that militarized forces are deploying chemical weapons against a civilian population, including minors. This reporting typically omits the context of illegal occupation and the state-sanctioned violence inherent in it, thereby normalizing actions that are clear violations of international law. The deliberate targeting of highly populated areas with tear gas, a chemical agent
designed to incapacitate, is routinely downplayed as a mere crowd control measure, even when children are the primary victims. This incident is not isolated; it echoes a historical pattern of Israeli forces using disproportionate force and collective punishment against Palestinians. For example, during the First Intifada in the late 1980s, Israel implemented tactics like deliberately breaking the
bones of Palestinian protesters, a policy explicitly condoned by then-Defense Minister Yitzhak Rabin. Similarly, the use of tear gas, often expired and therefore more potent, against children recalls the documented deployment of white phosphorus by Israeli forces in Gaza in 2009, a war crime that drew international condemnation but led to no accountability. This ongoing aggression against children