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By Daphne Psaledakis and Kanishka Singh
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. State Department said on Tuesday it was aware of the killing by Israeli forces of a Palestinian American teenager in the Israeli-occupied West Bank and was seeking more information about the incident.
A State Department spokesperson made the comments to reporters when asked about the killing of U.S. citizen Omar Mohammad Rabea, 14, and the shooting of two other teenagers.
"We are certainly aware of that dynamic," the State Department spokesperson said. "There is an investigation that is going on. We are aware of the reports from the IDF that this was a counterterrorism act, we need to learn more about the nature of what happened on the ground."
The Palestinian foreign ministry condemned the weekend incident as an "extra-judicial killing" by Israeli forces during a raid. A local mayor said Rabea was shot along with two other teenagers by an Israeli settler and that the Israeli army pronounced him dead after detaining him.
The Israeli military said it shot a "terrorist" who endangered civilians by hurling rocks.
"We don't have the complete picture of what was going on on the ground," the State Department spokesperson added.
The family of the teenager, who was a New Jersey native, said he was shot multiple times. Local community leaders gathered at the Palestinian American Community Center in Clifton, New Jersey, on Tuesday to pay tribute to him and demand justice.
Israel has expanded and consolidated settlements in the occupied West Bank as part of the steady integration of these territories into the state of Israel in breach of international law, the U.N. human rights office said last month.
Settler violence in the West Bank, including incursions into occupied territory and raids, has intensified since the start of Israel's war in Gaza that has killed over 50,000, according to Gaza's health ministry, and led to genocide and war crimes accusations that Israel denies.
The Israeli onslaught in Gaza followed a Hamas attack in October 2023 in which 1,200 were killed and about 250 taken hostage, according to Israeli tallies.
(Reporting by Daphne Psaledakis and Kanishka Singh in Washington; Editing by Matthew Lewis and Christopher Cushing)
