Four Palestinians were killed Friday by Israeli occupation forces in two separate incidents near the Gaza-Israel buffer zone.

The Israeli army announced that one of its soldiers died as a result of the attack.

The first incident took place in the Khan Younis and Rafah areas in the southern Gaza Strip, where Israeli tanks and aircraft targeted sites belonging to Ezzedine al-Qassam, the armed wing of Hamas movement, killing three of its members.

The second incident took place at the return marches, where a young man was killed and 120 others were wounded by Israeli army gunfire and tear gas.

The bodies of Palestinian martyrs Muhammed Şerif Bedvan and Muhammed Ebu Ferhane and Mahmud Kışta Şaban Ebu Hatır were buried in the city’s cemetery after the funeral prayer.

For almost four months, Palestinians in the Gaza Strip have been holding almost daily demonstrations near the Gaza-Israel buffer zone.

Since the demonstrations began on March 30, more than 140 Palestinian protesters have been martyred -- and thousands more injured -- by Israeli occupation army gunfire.

Protesters demand the “right of return” to their homes and villages in historical Palestine, from which they were driven in 1948 to make way for the new state of Israel.

They also demand an end to Israel’s 11-year blockade of the Gaza Strip, which has gutted the coastal enclave’s economy and deprived its roughly 2 million inhabitants of many basic commodities.