A funeral was held Sunday for a Palestinian-American and his friend who were killed in the Israel-occupied West Bank.
Saifullah Kamel Musallet, 20, a Tampa, Florida native, was killed in a confrontation with settlers while protecting his family’s land in the town of Singjil, north of Ramallah, according to his family and the Palestinian Health Ministry. His family told CBS News he was meant to be headed back to Florida this week after visiting family.
Musallet’s friend, Mohammed al-Shalabi, was shot in the chest, according to the health ministry.
On Sunday, their bodies were carried through the streets of Al-Mazraa a- Sharqiya, a town south of where they were killed. Mourners, waving Palestinian flags, chanted “God is great.”
Ammar Awad / REUTERS 
“He worked at his family’s ice cream shop in Tampa and was loved by so many people there. He was always kind and compassionate,” Musallet’s cousin Fatmah Muhammad, who is a business owner in Southern California, told CBS News on Saturday.
The U.S. State Department spokesperson confirmed Saturday to CBS News that a U.S. citizen died in the West Bank on Friday but referred questions about any investigation into the incident to Israel’s government. Musallet’s family, meanwhile, said it wants the U.S. to investigate.
“We demand the U.S. State Department lead an immediate investigation and hold the Israeli settlers who killed Saif accountable for their crimes,” the family’s statement read.
Courtesy from the Musallet Family 
Israel’s military has said Palestinians hurled rocks at Israelis in the area on Friday, lightly wounding two people and setting off a larger confrontation.
Violence in the West Bank is on the rise, with Israeli settlers expanding their efforts to occupy land in the contested region. Palestinians and rights groups have long accused the military of ignoring settler violence.
Musallet is the fifth American to be killed in the West Bank since the start of the Israel-Hamas war on Oct. 7, 2023.
Gaza ceasefire talks drag on
Meanwhile, Israel and Hamas appeared no closer to a breakthrough in talks meant to pause the 21-month war and free some Israeli hostages. The indirect talks over a U.S. proposal for a 60-day ceasefire began a week ago in Doha, Qatar.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was in Washington last week to discuss the deal with the Trump administration but a new sticking point has emerged over the deployment of Israeli troops during the truce, raising questions over the feasibility of a new deal, the Associated Press reported.
Israel wants to keep forces in what it says is an important land corridor in southern Gaza. Hamas views the insistence on troops in that strip of land as an indication that Israel intends to continue the war once a temporary ceasefire expires.
In a statement Sunday, Netanyahu’s office slammed Hamas for refusing to accept the framework of the most recent proposal, saying the terrorist group is “making unreasonable demands.”
JACK GUEZ/AFP via Getty Images 
Israel says it will only end the war once Hamas surrenders, disarms and goes into exile, something it refuses to do. Hamas says it is willing to free all the remaining 50 hostages, less than half said to be alive, in exchange for an end to the war and the full withdrawal of Israeli forces.
The 21-month war was sparked when Hamas terrorists attacked Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people and abducting 251. Many of those hostages have since either been released or their bodies have been recovered in ceasefire agreements or other deals.
Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed more than 58,000 Palestinians, more than half of them women and children, according to Gaza’s Hamas-run Health Ministry. The ministry doesn’t differentiate between civilians and combatants in its count. The United Nations and other international organizations see the Health Ministry’s figures as the most reliable statistics on war casualties.
Margaret Brennan
contributed to this report.
