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Israel’s military has opened an investigation into a deadly clash overnight on Monday, which saw a 15-year-old Palestinian shot and killed after Israeli vehicles were pelted with firebombs and stones on a major motorway.

An IDF spokesperson said yesterday that “in the course of gunfire to remove a threat, uninvolved people near the scene of the incident were accidentally hit”. The military police investigation will probe exactly why shots were fired and if the army’s protocol in such circumstances was followed. The injured Israelis were taken to a hospital in Jerusalem for treatment.

The incident occurred on the 443 motorway between Modi’in and Jerusalem, which skirts and, at points, crosses into the West Bank. Several vehicles were attacked as they drove near the village of Beit Sira. Three people were injured, including two British tourists. An IDF patrol from the Kfir infantry brigade gave chase to what they believed was a vehicle carrying the assailants. However, it appears that they fired on a car carrying a Palestinian family from a village near Ramallah. As a result, 15-year-old Mohammed Badaran was killed.

The 443 motorway has seen a number of deadly terrorist attacks since a wave of violence began last October, killing at least 35 Israelis. In January, 24-year-old Shlomit Krigman was stabbed and killed by a Palestinian near a mini-market in a West Bank community adjacent to the motorway. In November, 18-year-old Ziv Mizrahi was killed in a knife attack at a petrol station on the motorway. There have been several additional stabbings in the area.

Meanwhile, YNet reports that during an overnight operation, the IDF and Border Police arrested twelve wanted suspects in the West Bank, six of whom are suspected of involvement in terror, disruption of public order and violence toward civilians and security forces.