‘KILLING CHILDREN ONLY FUELS ANGER’
Fatal shooting of Palestinian teen draws concern about Gaza protests
MOHAMMAD Ayoub, 14, ignored his mother’s objection and slipped away to join this week’s protest along the Gaza-Israel border, just hours after Israel’s military dropped leaflets in his Gaza village warning residents to stay away.
A few hours later, the teenager was killed by an Israeli bullet to the head, Palestinian officials said.
“He asked his aunt to tell me he would be back in an hour,” said his mother, Raeda, who instead, buried her son on Friday.
His death brought to 35 the number of Palestinians killed since border clashes intensified on March 30 in an ongoing protest known as “The Great March of Return” — evoking a longtime call for refugees to regain ancestral homes in what is now Israel.
On Friday, Ayoub had been among the thousands who gathered to protest. Israel’s use of live fire had drawn international criticism and Ayoub’s death received special attention.
“It is outrageous to shoot at children! How does the killing of a child in Gaza today help peace?
“It doesn’t! It fuels anger and breeds more killing. Children must be protected from violence, not exposed to it,” United Nations Middle East envoy Nickolay Mladenov wrote on Twitter.
Ayoub’s family said friends of their son told them he was not among stone throwers.
Matthias Schmale, the Gaza director of operations of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), which provides aid to over half of the population here, said Ayoub was the third student of UN-run schools to be killed in recent weeks.
“Deeply disturbing news that child killed yesterday was yet another student at UNRWA school — two others were killed previously,” Schamale wrote on Twitter.
“Children should never be targets.”