Ramallah: When he intervened in a dispute to separate youths from his family from members of another family to prevent a brawl, Mohammad Abd Dawood Abu Zaitoun, an 83-year-old from Balatah Refugee Camp near Nablus, was shot in the chest and died on the spot.

The fight then began in earnest and as a result a further four people were shot while elderly people, younger women and children looked on. The injured were later hospitalised.

According to a police statement, the Palestinian public prosecution ordered an autopsy of the victim’s body and the police launched an investigation into the brawl claimed by sources to have been caused by a dispute between two children over a toy during the Eid Al Fitr vacation.

The Palestinian Police have warned about the high degree of violence in the West Bank society where the spread of cold weapons has crossed all red lines.

“The holy month of Ramadan, which is supposed to be solely devoted to worshiping, has been a nightmare regarding the number of brawls reported in the West Bank,” said a police statement. “During this Ramadan, a total of 974 brawls were reported in the West Bank, with six deaths, 200 moderate to serious injuries and hundreds of other light injuries.”

Acts committed during the brawls have included the burning of houses, smashing of vehicles and the terrifying of women and children. “Firearms and cold arms are heavily used in the brawls reported in the West Bank, and the West Bankers are always engaged in fighting and brawling with each other,” said a police source.

The highest number of Ramadan brawls was reported in Hebron with 207 fights, followed by Ramallah with 155 fights, Nablus with 153 and Qalqilia with 124.

The local reconciliation committee in Qalqilia has been busy round the clock. “Reconciliation is one of the most difficult challenges in our society,” said one member of the committee.

“Children of the age group 5-10 are armed with cold weapons which they do not hesitate to use when it matters and such a time is determined by the child himself,” the committee member said.

He said that his committee has raised this issue with the city’s governor and Palestinian senior authorities, proposing hefty monetory penalties against the guardians of armed children. “Palestinians brawling with each other has become a plague in the entire society,” he told Gulf News, stressing that this phenomenon needs to be addressed at the highest levels of society.

“The situation is currently totally out of control,” he stressed. “We truly believe that the entire Palestinian society stands urgently in need of collective psychiatric therapy to diagnose and treat this level of violence.”

Dr Samir Quta, a clinical psychologist, believes the Palestinian individual lives in tension in all aspects of life and that Palestinians release this tension against one another. “The level of tension in the mind of the Palestinian individual is possibly the highest in the world as Palestinians are under severe pressure politically, economically and socially,” he told Gulf News. “This pressure makes it easy for the Palestinian child to use a knife, cut and see the bleeding of others.”