Palestinian girl pulled alive from rubble
GAZA — Six-year-old Suzy Eshkuntana woke up alone in Gaza's largest hospital where she was rushed by rescuers from the rubble of her home, which had been wrecked by a pre-dawn Israeli strike that killed her mother and all four of her siblings.
The young girl, trapped for seven hours under the debris, was reunited in Shifa hospital with her father, who was also being treated for his wounds.
"Forgive me, my daughter. You screamed to me to come to you, but I couldn't come," Riyad Eshkuntana told her after medics brought them together in adjoining beds.
The Palestinian family's home was hit in Israeli air strikes early on Sunday on Gaza City. Dozens of rescue workers, police officers, relatives and neighbours searched though the rubble. After several hours, workers under the collapsed walls began to chant "Allahu Akbar" — God is greatest — a signal that someone would be brought out alive.
Suzy, covered in dust and too weak to raise her head, wept as she was taken to an ambulance.