Palestinians said an unidentified 17-year-old protester was in serious condition after being shot in the head.
Israel’s military confirmed that it dispersed a group of masked, rock-throwing Palestinians near the town of Iraq Burin with tear gas and rubber bullets.
It said the Palestinians were holding a violent, illegal riot and were approaching a nearby settlement in a threatening manner.
The military said its troops did not use live bullets and said it was investigating reports of the Palestinian death.
The settlement announcement has sparked outrage and protests from Palestinians, as well as condemnation from Israel’s closest ally — the United States — and the UN chief.
From a hilltop observation post on the outskirts of the Palestinian city of Ramallah, Ban got a closer look yesterday at some of the Israeli enclaves scattered across Palestinian-claimed territories.
The panorama included the sprawling West Bank settlement of Givat Zeev, home to 11,000 Israelis who live in rows of red-roofed houses, and Jewish neighborhoods in traditionally Arab East Jerusalem, the Israeli-annexed sector of the city that Palestinians claim as a future capital.
The brief geography lesson came a day after Ban, US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, and other major Mideast mediators — known as the Quartet — met in Moscow to try to find a way to restart Israeli-Palestinian peace talks.
The mediators urged Israel to halt all settlement construction. Israel has agreed to curb settlement construction in the West Bank, but not in East Jerusalem, claiming the entire city as Israel’s eternal capital.
Yesterday, Ban rejected Israel’s distinction between East Jerusalem and the West Bank, noting that both are occupied lands.
“The world has condemned Israel’s settlement plans in East Jerusalem,’’ Ban told a news conference after his brief tour. “Let us be clear. All settlement activity is illegal anywhere in occupied territory and must be stopped.’’
Ban also expressed concern about what he said was a worsening humanitarian situation in blockaded Hamas-ruled Gaza.
