Israeli occupation authorities handed over the body of 50-year-old Palestinian woman Naifa Kaabna, from Aqbat Jabr refugee camp, in the eastern West Bank city of Jericho, to her family more than a year after she was fatally shot by Israeli forces, according to human rights sources.

The Jerusalem Legal Aid and Human Rights Center (JLAC) said the body of Naifa Kaabna, the mother of nine, has been withheld by the Israeli occupation authorities for over one year.

Israeli occupation forces shot and killed the mother last year, in what Palestinians and human rights center deemed as cold-blooded murder at Qalandia military checkpoint between Ramallah and Jerusalem. Israeli forces claimed she attempted to stab a soldier, which was denied by eye-witnesses.

JLAC attempted since the shooting to get Israel to return the body to her family for burial and to investigate the incident and to get video recordings at the checkpoint, but to no avail. The body was kept in the morgue all this time.

The human right center petitioned the Israeli High Court in February to get the body of Kaabna back, but the court has delayed any action. In August, it ordered the army to explain why it was still holding Kaabna’s body.

The army decided by the end of last week to turn the body over to her family and Kaabna was finally laid to rest at her refugee camp.

Israel decided on October 13, 2015 to withhold bodies of Palestinians its forces kill in the occupied territories and use them as a bargaining chip in future prisoners’ exchange talks with the Palestinian factions.

According to JLAC, Israel is holding bodies of 66 Palestinians its forces have shot and killed in the last years, most of them kept in the morgues, while some were buried in unknown locations. In addition, 254 Palestinians killed by Israel since 1967 are still buried in what is known as “cemeteries of numbers” in Israel, while 74 are still unaccounted for.