Aysenur, the activist for Palestine who was killed by an Israeli soldier

Aysenur Ezgi Eygi’s parents want her to be buried in Didim, Turkey, where the young Turkish-American woman was born.

The 26-year-old activist for Palestine was shot dead by Israeli troops last Friday while protesting against illegal Israeli settlements in Beita, south of Nablus in the occupied West Bank.

Turkish officials worked for days to secure the repatriation of Aysenur’s body for a burial planned on Friday.

Aysenur, a recent graduate of the University of Washington in Seattle, in the United States, was protesting against an Israeli settlement in nearby Evyatar when she was shot in the head.

Grief welled for the young activist and a huge funeral procession was held for her in Nablus on Tuesday.

Senior members of the Palestine Authority (PA) escorted her body, draped in a Palestinian flag and keffiyeh, through the town before it was carried away by a Palestinian ambulance.

‘Old soul’

Sam Chesneau, a co-founder and director of the Seattle-based American-Muslim organisation Wasat, of which Aysenur had been a member, described her as “an old soul, wise beyond her years, a truly caring person and profound thinker” who had “a tremendous sense of humour”.

“The world mourns her because we all recognise the best potential of ourselves in her,” Chesneau said.

“She reminds us to make peace with death and, rather, fear a life of apathy, of choosing safety at the expense of our beliefs and our humanity.”

Palestinian officers carry the body of Turkish American Aysenur Ezgi Eygi, covered with a keffiyeh and the Palestinian flag, during a memorial service in Nablus, the occupied West Bank, on September 9, 2024. Her family demanded an independent investigation into her killing by Israeli forces [Jaafar Ashtiyeh/AFP]

From Aysenur’s family’s home in Didum, her aunt Gulay Yeniceoglu told local media the young activist was “a very compassionate person and could not turn a blind eye to injustice”.

Aysenur was killed during a peaceful protest against the illegal settlement in Eyvatar, established on Palestinian land in the West Bank in 2013.

‘She was smiling’

Witnesses to Aysenur’s killing have also contradicted Israeli claims that her death was accidental.

Among them was Italian activist “Mariam” who rode with Aysenur in the ambulance as she was transferred to Beita and then to Nablus, where she was pronounced dead.

Mariam said: “We were clearly visible to the army, there was nothing happening next to us … it was a shoot to kill.”

While she had just met Aysenur when they arrived in Palestine, Mariam said about her: “She was a kind person … she was ready to be here, in the field, in support of the Palestinian struggle. She was smiling, she prayed when we were in the garden.”

A friend of Aysenur’s, who had arrived in the occupied West Bank for the first time three days before the killing, told the online title +972 that the protest at Beita was her and Aysenur’s first.

“We were brand new,” the friend, who gave her name as EN, said. “She was aware of the risks; she had a clearer picture than me about the situation in different parts of the West Bank … from talking to people and researching and knowing people that experienced tragedies.

“But it is still hard to grasp if you haven’t spent a lot of time here,” EN continued.

“How can you know that you will get shot in the head in the first hour or two of being on the ground? She wasn’t on the front line but at the back, and they still murdered her.”

Israel issued a brief statement on Tuesday, in which it said that it had investigated and that Aysenur was “highly likely hit indirectly and unintentionally” by its forces in the area.

It added that the bullet which struck Aysenur in the head had not been “aimed at her, but aimed at the key instigator of the riot” and that the military had “deep regret” over Aysenur’s death.

The International Solidarity Movement (ISM), with which Aysenur was volunteering, said the protest was peaceful.

Aysenur’s killing has drawn comparisons with that of Rachel Corrie, another US citizen volunteering with the ISM when she was killed by an Israeli army bulldozer while protesting in Rafah, Gaza, in 2003.

More than 10 years later, an Israeli civil judge found in favour of the army in a case brought by Corrie’s family, ruling her death an accident.

‘They shot to kill’

Israeli activist Jonathan Pollak, who was at the protest and was one of the first people to reach Aysenur after she was shot, said the group had retreated from their protest spot at the top of the Mount Sabih hill and from Israeli soldiers who had fired tear gas at them.

The activists were standing within the built-up area of Beita for about 30 minutes, during which time the soldiers took over the rooftop of a house at the top of the hill.

That home belonged to the daughter of Munir Khudair, who was on the roof that Friday, he told Al Jazeera: “Of course, the army surrounds this house every Friday and climbs onto the roof to use it to shoot at demonstrators. The army came … and we went downstairs.”

At the time when two shots sounded, Munir said, there were no confrontations or friction. “I think it was a sniper who fired,” he said, adding: “We heard shouting from the group, saying: ‘Injury! Injury!'”

About 90 minutes after the shooting, the soldiers left Munir’s daughter’s home.

Pollak said that he was certain the shots were live ammunition. “I’ve been doing this for 20 years, I know the difference between the sound of rubber bullets, tear gas and live ammunition.

“One of them hit a metal object and then the thigh of a young man from the village, and then another shot was heard.”

Pollak was called over to where Aysenur had fallen, and he held his hand – still bloodied as he spoke right after the attack – to the back of her head to try to stem the bleeding.

“There is nothing that can justify this shooting,” he said adamantly. “They shot to kill … 17 people have been killed in demonstrations in Beita by the Israeli army since 2021.

In response to Israel’s admission of partial responsibility for Aysenur’s death, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken slammed the killing, calling it “unprovoked and unjustified” and called for “fundamental changes” in the way Israel operates in the West Bank.

However, US President Joe Biden later appeared to disregard Blinken’s comments, supporting Israel’s characterisation of Aysenur’s killing as an “accident”.

The day after Aysenur’s killing, her family issued a statement through the ISM, calling for an independent US investigation into her death which does not involve the Israeli military to “ensure full accountability for the guilty parties”.

The United Nations Human Rights Office spokesperson Ravina Shamdasani told the Turkish Anadolu news agency that they were calling for an “independent international investigation into the violations that have been committed in the Palestinian territory”, without further clarification.

Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has promised to take “every legal step” to ensure her blood “was not spilled in vain” – actions including a potential appeal to the International Court of Justice, already investigating Israel on charges of potential genocide.