Palestinian health ministry says baby killed and parents wounded by Israeli gunfire in West Bank

A seven-month-old baby has been killed and his parents were wounded in the West Bank after Israeli soldiers opened fire, the Palestinian health ministry said.

It named the infant as Sam Fahd Abu Haikal and said he died at the scene of the shooting in the Tel Rumeida area of the city of Hebron on Friday evening.

The baby boy's injured parents were described as being in a moderate condition.

His grandmother said the family was driving near Checkpoint 17 ​when they saw Israeli military vehicles and soldiers in the distance and stopped the car.

She said the soldiers fired shots towards them, which the family initially believed to be warning shots.

"One bullet struck my grandson, ⁠traversed his face and crossed his head, striking his mother's cheek where it lodged," she said.

The boy's father, Fahd Abdul Aziz Abu Haikal, a lecturer at Bethlehem University, was shot in the hand, the official Palestinian news agency WAFA reported.

The bullet grazed his finger, according to the grandmother, adding that the mother was in hospital.

WAFA said the family was travelling from Bethlehem to visit relatives in Hebron when soldiers opened fire.

Israel Defence Forces (IDF) said soldiers saw a vehicle accelerating toward them and one soldier fired single shots at the vehicle, during operational activity in the Hebron area on Friday.

The IDF said three Palestinians were wounded and evacuated ⁠for medical treatment.

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An initial military inquiry found ​that those injured were "uninvolved civilians" and the incident was under review and ​that the findings would be submitted to the relevant authorities.

Tel ⁠Rumeida, an area of Hebron where Israeli settlers live under heavy military protection among Palestinian residents, has become a flashpoint for ⁠violence in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.

Over ​700,000 settlers live in East Jerusalem and the West Bank ​among more than three million Palestinians, according to a European Union report in 2024.

Since the Hamas-led 7 October 2023 attacks on Israel, more than 1,000 Palestinians have been killed in the West Bank, amid a rise in settler violence, according to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA).

Over 72,000 people in Gaza have been killed since ⁠the war ​started, most of them civilians, according to Gaza health authorities.

Hamas ​killed 1,200 people and took 251 Israeli and foreign hostages in its 7 October attacks, Israel said.

(c) Sky News 2026: Palestinian health ministry says baby killed and parents wounded by Israeli gunfire in West B