Three Palestinian children killed
Three Palestinian children have been killed on the third day of an Israeli army raid on the Gaza town of Beit Lahiya.
A 16-year-old boy was killed by a large-calibre bullet in his back while throwing rocks at soldiers, a girl, nine, was shot in the stomach outside her apartment complex and a four-year-old girl died of tear gas inhalation, doctors believe.
Mohammed Elmalfouh, 16, is the third stone-thrower to be killed in as many days, along with seven gunmen and six bystanders.
Sitting in a mourning tent, Mohammed’s family tried to make sense of his death. His father, Rassem, said it was God’s will, but he had trouble fighting off the tears.
Mohammed’s older brother, 17-year-old Ahmed, still had blood stains on his hands and jeans, from a last embrace in the hospital morgue.
“No one can fill his place in my heart,” Ahmed said of his brother.
On Thursday morning, Ahmed stood on a balcony and just caught a glimpse of his brother as he left the house, notebook in hand. Mohammed told his mother he was on his way to a private math tutorial. Schools were closed in Beit Lahiya, as on previous days, because they are too close to Israeli tank positions.
Mohammed never made it to math class. He walked several hundred meters in the direction of the Israeli settlement of Nissanit. Earlier in the day, tanks had pulled out of Beit Lahiya and deployed on the outskirts of the settlement. Dozens of teens followed the armoured vehicles, Mohammed among them, throwing stones and drawing machine gun fire across sand dunes and empty plots.
Mohammed was about 300 meters from a tank when he was killed by a machine gun bullet in the back, Palestinian medics said.
His father, Rassem, head of the Palestinian Authority body that deals with volunteer organisations, said he had told his children, four boys and a girl, that education is important. However, he said, it is impossible to shield them from the violence around them.
“I was and I am still doing my best as a father to protect my children,” Rassem Elmalfouh said. “But this did not mean that I am advising my sons to grow up like cowards.”
In more than three years of fighting, Israeli troops have repeatedly raided Gaza towns and refugees camps in search of militants.
In a typical raid, tanks rumbling through the streets are pelted with stones or come under fire from gunmen.
The Israeli military said that in Thursday’s confrontations, about 100 Palestinians threw stones, but also firebombs, grenades and explosive devices toward the tanks.
The army said soldiers fired at armed men, not at stone throwers.
However, a large apartment complex in Beit Lahiya, home to about 4,000 people, was within firing range of the tanks and the facades of several apartments showed bullet marks.
Nine-year-old Mona Abutabaq was standing outside her apartment building when she was shot in the stomach by a machine gun bullet and critically wounded. She died several hours later.
