Israel's High Court has rejected an appeal by reserve soldiers refusing to serve in the occupied territories. And in the Gaza Strip early today, Israeli troops killed a Palestinian.
Palestinians accused Israeli troops on Monday of beating to death a teenager in the West Bank city of Hebron, while sources from both sides of the conflict said troops shot dead a Hamas gunman and two other Palestinians.
In a legal battle on the sidelines of Israeli-Palestinian violence that has raged for 27 months, eight reserve soldiers lost an appeal to Israel's High Court to sanction their refusal to serve in the occupied territories.
A three-judge panel said it could not back the idea of "selective conscientious objection", declaring that such a policy could loosen the bonds that hold Israelis together.
The army had argued it would harm the security of the Jewish state, which is locked in a bloody conflict with the Palestinians that shows no signs of abating.
In the Gaza Strip today, soldiers and Palestinian gunmen exchanged fire near the Jewish settlement of Neve Dekalim, Palestinian security officials said.
One Palestinian was killed but it was not immediately clear if he was involved in the shooting, the officials added. An Israeli military source said soldiers shot at two armed men, hitting one of them.
Late on Monday, a 17-year-old Palestinian was pronounced dead in hospital in Hebron after he was beaten by soldiers who stopped him for a curfew violation, Palestinian officials said.
The army spokesman had no immediate comment on the Hebron incident. A military source said the teenager's family had filed a complaint with Israeli civilian police in the divided city.
Earlier yesterday, troops killed a Hamas militant who fought a gun battle with them after infiltrating into Israel from the Gaza Strip, the Israeli army and Palestinian sources said.
In the West Bank, Palestinian witnesses said soldiers also shot dead a 20-year-old Palestinian man during a clash in the city of Nablus and a 37-year-old teacher whose car collided with an army jeep near the town of Jenin.
An army spokesman said that after the collision, which overturned the jeep, the driver of the car emerged holding an object which soldiers "mistakenly identified as a gun" and they shot and killed him.
The spokesman said the army had opened an investigation.