A 30-year-old Palestinian man was killed last night in a shooting in the village of Yarka, in the Galilee region in the north of 1948-occupied Palestine, according to witnesses.

Arab 48 website said Sarhan Atallah, 30, was killed in the shooting while two others were reportedly stabbed and critically wounded in a related act of violence in the village.

Over 56 Palestinian nationals of Israel have been killed since the beginning of the year in an ongoing crime wave, blamed for Israeli Police tolerance of criminality and suspected collaboration with criminal gangs.

Palestinians in today’s Israel are those who stayed on their land following the creation of the occupying state in 1948 and their descendants. They make up about 20 percent of the country’s nine million people.

By law, their rights are equal to those of Jewish citizens. But in practice they suffer discrimination in employment, housing, policing and other essentials.

Palestinians have long blamed the Israeli police for turning a blind eye to gun violence among Arab Israelis and even complicity with criminal gangs.

Source: Palestinian News & Info Agency