Photo shows Israeli soldier taking aim at Palestinian woman

An image has emerged which appears to show the final moment before the fatal shooting of a young Palestinian woman.

A photo supplied by an activist group shows a soldier pointing a gun at the young woman. Source: (Supplied by Youth Against Settlements)

The photograph shows an Israeli soldier taking aim at a woman, believed to be 19-year-old Palestinian student Hadeel al-Hashlamun, before she was shot and killed at an Israeli checkpoint in the West Bank city of Hebron.

The military said troops shot a Palestinian woman as she tried to stab a soldier. A family member said Hadeel al-Hashlamun was taken to an Israeli hospital where she was later declared dead.

The soldier was not wounded.

Pictures distributed by the Youth Against Settlements group appear to show a soldier, who could be seen aiming his rifle at a woman said to be Hashlamun, standing a short distance away.

There has been a surge in confrontations, often involving rock and petrol bomb throwing, since Israeli-Palestinian peace talks broke down in April 2014 - though violence has not approached the levels of past Palestinian uprisings.