Ramallah, Aug 27 (IANS): The Israeli army has killed a Palestinian man in the West Bank city of Hebron, said Palestinian sources.

"Iyad al-Najjar, 46, from the town of Yatta south of Hebron, was killed after being shot in the head by Israeli soldiers," the Ramallah-based Palestinian Health Ministry said on Monday in a brief statement without providing further details as reported by Xinhua news agency.

Palestinian security sources told Xinhua that Israeli forces shot al-Najjar near the separation wall on the outskirts of the town.

So far, the Israeli army has not commented on the incident.

With al-Najjar's death, the number of Palestinians killed by Israeli fire and bombing in the West Bank and East Jerusalem since October 7, 2023, has risen to 645, including 147 children, according to data from the Health Ministry.

Witnesses told Turkish news agency Anadolu Ajansi that an Israeli military unit opened fire at Palestinians near the "apartheid wall," hitting Abdel-Najjar. He was rushed to a hospital, where he was pronounced dead.

On Sunday evening, the Palestinian Health Ministry reported that two Palestinians were killed by Israeli gunfire near the city of Salfit.

Over the past few years, Israeli forces have conducted regular raids in the West Bank, which escalated after the war on Gaza last October, which killed more than 40,000 Palestinians.

Palestinians have also been violently attacked by illegal Israeli settlers.

At least 646 Palestinians have since been killed and nearly 5,400 others injured by Israeli army fire in the occupied territory, according to the Health Ministry.

In a landmark opinion on July 19, the International Court of Justice declared Israel's decades-long occupation of Palestinian land unlawful and demanded the evacuation of all existing settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.