The Israeli military has said an American activist who was killed in the West Bank last week is likely to have been shot “indirectly and unintentionally” by Israeli forces who were aiming at someone else.

Aysenur Ezgi Eygi, a 26-year-old from Seattle, was killed on Friday following a demonstration against Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank, according to Jonathan Pollak, an Israeli protester who witnessed the shooting.

The military said its inquiry “found that it is highly likely that she was hit indirectly and unintentionally by (Israeli army) fire which was not aimed at her, but aimed at the key instigator of the riot”.

The White House had earlier said it was “deeply disturbed” by the death of Ms Eygi, who also held Turkish citizenship, and called on Israel to investigate what happened.

In his account to the Associated Press, Mr Pollak said the shooting happened about half an hour after clashes between Palestinians and Israeli forces had subsided.

Ms Eygi, a volunteer with the activist group International Solidarity Movement, was attending a weekly demonstration against settlement expansion that has been held for years and has often brought Israeli crackdowns and stone-throwing by protesters.

The killing came amid a surge of violence in the West Bank since the Israel-Hamas war began in October, with increasing Israeli raids, attacks by Palestinian militants on Israelis, attacks by Israeli settlers on Palestinians and heavier military crackdowns on Palestinian protests.

More than 690 Palestinians have been killed, according to Palestinian health officials.