Children in the Israeli–Palestinian conflict
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Children in the Israeli–Palestinian conflict refers to the impact of the
Israeli–Palestinian conflict The Israeli–Palestinian conflict is one of the world's most enduring conflicts, beginning in the mid-20th century. Various attempts have been made to resolve the conflict as part of the Israeli–Palestinian peace process, alongside other ef ...
on minors in
Israel Israel (; he, יִשְׂרָאֵל, ; ar, إِسْرَائِيل, ), officially the State of Israel ( he, מְדִינַת יִשְׂרָאֵל, label=none, translit=Medīnat Yīsrāʾēl; ), is a country in Western Asia. It is situated ...
and the
Palestinian territories The Palestinian territories are the two regions of the former British Mandate for Palestine that have been militarily occupied by Israel since the Six-Day War of 1967, namely: the West Bank (including East Jerusalem) and the Gaza Strip. The I ...
. Laurel Holliday, in her 1999 book ''Children of Israel/Palestine'', writes that two "ethnically distinct peoples – both Palestinians and Israeli Jews – lay claim to the very same sand, stone, rivers, vegetation, seacoast, and mountains" and that the stories she presents show that "Israeli and Palestinian children grow up feeling that they are destined for conflict with their neighbors". Both the
Israeli Defense Forces Israeli may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to the State of Israel * Israelis, citizens or permanent residents of the State of Israel * Modern Hebrew, a language * ''Israeli'' (newspaper), published from 2006 to 2008 * Guni Israeli ...
and militant Palestinian groups have been accused of violating the rights of children and causing injury and death. According to
B'tselem B'Tselem ( he, בצלם, , " in the image of od) is a Jerusalem-based non-profit organization whose stated goals are to document human rights violations in the Israeli-occupied Palestinian territories, combat any denial of the existence of su ...
's calculations (2021), some 2,171 Palestinian children have been killed in the last two decades by Israeli military actions, and 139 Israeli children have been killed by Palestinian militants.'Killing of Minors,'
B'tselem B'Tselem ( he, בצלם, , " in the image of od) is a Jerusalem-based non-profit organization whose stated goals are to document human rights violations in the Israeli-occupied Palestinian territories, combat any denial of the existence of su ...
2021.
Joseph Massad Joseph Andoni Massad ( ar, جوزيف مسعد; born 1963) is a Jordanian academic specializing in Middle Eastern studies, who serves as Professor of Modern Arab Politics and Intellectual History in the Department of Middle Eastern, South Asian, ...
has argued that the Western media are far more sensitive to the deaths of Jewish children than to child fatalities among Palestinians. Sarah Honig argues the opposite position, that the international media tolerates murder of Jewish children, particularly settler children. In late April 2015
Human Rights Watch Human Rights Watch (HRW) is an international non-governmental organization, headquartered in New York City, that conducts research and advocacy on human rights. The group pressures governments, policy makers, companies, and individual human r ...
asked the UN to put both Israel and
Hamas Hamas (, ; , ; an acronym of , "Islamic Resistance Movement") is a Palestinian Sunni-Islamic fundamentalist, militant, and nationalist organization. It has a social service wing, Dawah, and a military wing, the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Bri ...
on its "List of Shame" regarding grave violations of children's rights in a conflict.'UN: Ensure Integrity of Children's ‘List of Shame’,'
Human Rights Watch Human Rights Watch (HRW) is an international non-governmental organization, headquartered in New York City, that conducts research and advocacy on human rights. The group pressures governments, policy makers, companies, and individual human r ...
4 June 2015.
United Nations Secretary General
António Guterres António Manuel de Oliveira Guterres ( , ; born 30 April 1949) is a Portuguese politician and diplomat. Since 2017, he has served as secretary-general of the United Nations, the ninth person to hold this title. A member of the Portuguese Socia ...
said in 2021: "If there is a hell on earth, it is the lives of children in Gaza today"


History

Youth have been engaged in military action since before the creation of Israel. In the
1929 Hebron massacre The Hebron massacre refers to the killing of sixty-seven or sixty-nine Jews on 24 August 1929 in Hebron, then part of Mandatory Palestine, by Arabs incited to violence by rumors that Jews were planning to seize control of the Temple Mount in ...
, 67 Jews were killed, young children among them; Arab youths initiated the violence by hurling rocks at Jewish students as they walked by. In 1948, adolescent fighters from the
Irgun Irgun • Etzel , image = Irgun.svg , image_size = 200px , caption = Irgun emblem. The map shows both Mandatory Palestine and the Emirate of Transjordan, which the Irgun claimed in its entirety for a future Jewish state. The acronym "Etzel" i ...
and
Lehi Lehi (; he, לח"י – לוחמי חרות ישראל ''Lohamei Herut Israel – Lehi'', "Fighters for the Freedom of Israel – Lehi"), often known pejoratively as the Stern Gang,"This group was known to its friends as LEHI and to its enemie ...
paramilitary groups participated in a massacre of 107 Palestinian residents of the village of
Deir Yassin Deir Yassin ( ar, دير ياسين, Dayr Yāsīn) was a Palestinian Arab village of around 600 inhabitants about west of Jerusalem. Deir Yassin declared its neutrality during the 1948 Palestine war between Arabs and Jews. The village was razed ...
, a number of whom were children. Hirst, David, ''The Gun and the Olive Branch''. Faber and Faber
pp. 252–253
, 2003, (first published 1977).
Since the Six-Day War, when the West Bank and the Gaza Strip fell under Israeli military occupation, according to
Anton Shammas Anton Shammas ( ar, أنطون شماس, he, אנטון שמאס; born 1950), is a Palestinian writer, poet and translator of Arabic, Hebrew and English. Biography Anton Shammas was one of six children born to a Palestinian father and a Lebanese ...
, the idea of 'childhood' was abolished and dropped from Israeli military declarations, so that if a 10-year-old happened to be shot, he was referred to as 'a young man of ten'.
Lisa Hajjar Lisa Hajjar is a professor of sociology at the University of California-Santa Barbara and editor of ''Jadaliyya ''Jadaliyya'' ("dialectic") is an independent ezine founded in 2010 by the Arab Studies Institute (ASI) to cover the Arab World and ...

''Courting Conflict: The Israeli Military Court System in the West Bank and Gaza''
, University of California Press, 2005 p.191.
With the outbreak of the
First Intifada The First Intifada, or First Palestinian Intifada (also known simply as the intifada or intifadah),The word ''intifada'' () is an Arabic word meaning "uprising". Its strict Arabic transliteration is '. was a sustained series of Palestinian ...
(1987–1993), stone-throwing was defined as a felony, children began to be arrested with bail set at US$400, and if this was not paid, they could be held in administrative detention for 1 year. The continued Israeli occupation and the stalled
Israeli–Palestinian peace process The Israeli–Palestinian peace process refers to the intermittent discussions held by various parties and proposals put forward in an attempt to resolve the ongoing Israeli–Palestinian conflict. Since the 1970s, there has been a parallel ef ...
has led to Palestinian protests and
political violence Political violence is violence which is perpetrated in order to achieve political goals. It can include violence which is used by a state against other states (war), violence which is used by a state against civilians and non-state actors (forced ...
, building up to mass protests during the First Intifada. Many youth were involved in nonviolent demonstrations, sit-ins, walk-outs, boycotts, civil disobedience and strikes organized by popular committees.Julie M. Norman, ''The Activist and the Olive Tree: Nonviolent Resistance in the Second Intifada'', The American University, ProQuest, 2009
p. 69–70
,
There also was rioting, grenade throwing, and suicide bombings. J. Kuttab refers to the First Intifada as the "children's revolt" because youth "possessed a new spirit that challenged the occupation" and inspired even adults to action.
James L. Gelvin James L. Gelvin (born February 12, 1951) is an American scholar of Middle Eastern history. He has been a faculty member in the department of history at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) since 1995 and has written extensively on the h ...
has written that the "paradigmatic symbol" of the First Intifada was "unarmed Palestinian children throwing stones at Israeli tanks." Approximately 90 percent of young males and 80 percent of young females engaged in some form of activism. The much more violent
Second Intifada The Second Intifada ( ar, الانتفاضة الثانية, ; he, האינתיפאדה השנייה, ), also known as the Al-Aqsa Intifada ( ar, انتفاضة الأقصى, label=none, '), was a major Palestinian uprising against Israel. ...
(2000–2005) was led by adults in the
Palestine Liberation Organization The Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO; ar, منظمة التحرير الفلسطينية, ') is a Palestinian nationalism, Palestinian nationalist political and militant organization founded in 1964 with the initial purpose of establ ...
following the collapse of the 1993 Oslo Accords. A 2007 survey showed that 17 percent of the Palestinian population is made up of children under the age of five, and 46 percent under 15.Poll: 10% of Palestinian children have lasting malnutrition effects
,
Associated Press The Associated Press (AP) is an American non-profit news agency headquartered in New York City. Founded in 1846, it operates as a cooperative, unincorporated association. It produces news reports that are distributed to its members, U.S. newspa ...
article in ''
Haaretz ''Haaretz'' ( , originally ''Ḥadshot Haaretz'' – , ) is an Israeli newspaper. It was founded in 1918, making it the longest running newspaper currently in print in Israel, and is now published in both Hebrew and English in the Berliner f ...
'', April 11, 2007.
In 2012, it was estimated that the densely populated Gaza Strip has a population of 1.7 million, over 800,000 of whom are children.Ryan Villarreal
Israel's Blockade Of Gaza Puts Palestinian Children's Health At Risk: Report
, ''
International Business Times The ''International Business Times'' is an American online news publication that publishes five national editions in four languages. The publication, sometimes called ''IBTimes'' or ''IBT'', offers news, opinion and editorial commentary on busi ...
'', June 14, 2012.
Rock throwing and firebomb attacks by Palestinians on Israeli residents have been described as regular occurrences in the West Bank, and in many cases they directly affect children. Israelis have recounted incidents in which Palestinians targeted children on school buses, and report that in Hebron they "routinely throw stones at children in the playground". According to the IDF, Arab snipers have fired at cars containing children, and
rockets A rocket (from it, rocchetto, , bobbin/spool) is a vehicle that uses jet propulsion to accelerate without using the surrounding air. A rocket engine produces thrust by reaction to exhaust expelled at high speed. Rocket engines work entirely fr ...
from Gaza have landed in locations that are typically frequented by large numbers of children. A UN draft report on children in armed conflict, scheduled for publication in mid-June 2015, and prepared by
Leila Zerrougui Leila Zerrougui (born 1956) is an Algerian legal expert on human rights and administration of justice. She has served as the Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General and Head of the United Nations Stabilization Mission in the Democratic ...
for the Secretary General of the United Nations reportedly recommended adding both Israel and Hamas to the "List of Shame", due to repeated violations of children's rights. Human Rights Watch wrote to Ban Ki-Moon on the 27 April requesting that the names of Israel and Hamas remain on the list, in the context of reports that Israel had been lobbying to have its name removed. Israel denies it has lobbied the UN over this. Inclusion in the list requires that a pattern of multiple instances of repeated abuses of children be evidenced. Human Rights Watch cited in its 2014 report on events in the Israeli–Palestinian conflict over the preceding year, nearly a dozen cases of Palestinian children killed by Israeli security forces, and over 1,200 Palestinian children injured. In addition 41 incidents in which school facilities were damaged, classes interrupted and students injured by IDF forces were registered. Palestinian armed groups, the reports also noted, had launched in the same period some 63 rockets into Israel from Gaza, resulting in disruptions to their schooling of over 12,000 Israeli children.


Terrorist attacks targeting children

Though Israeli children were killed in the conflict during the decades prior, the first acts of Palestinian violence specifically targeting large numbers of Israeli children were committed in the 1970s. The
Avivim school bus massacre The Avivim school bus bombing was a terrorist attack on an Israeli school bus on 22 May 1970, in which 12 civilians were killed, nine of them children, and 25 were wounded, one of whom died of a wound sustained in the attack 44 years later. The ...
was a
terrorist attack Terrorism, in its broadest sense, is the use of criminal violence to provoke a state of terror or fear, mostly with the intention to achieve political or religious aims. The term is used in this regard primarily to refer to intentional violen ...
on an Israeli school bus on May 22, 1970 in which 12 Israeli civilians were killed, nine of them children, and 25 were wounded. The attack took place on the road to Moshav
Avivim Avivim ( he, אֲבִיבִים), is a moshav in the far north of Israel, in the Upper Galilee. It is located less than one kilometre (3,000 feet) from the Blue Line with Lebanon. In its population was . History Mandatory period In 1920, Saliha ...
, near Israel's border with
Lebanon Lebanon ( , ar, لُبْنَان, translit=lubnān, ), officially the Republic of Lebanon () or the Lebanese Republic, is a country in Western Asia. It is located between Syria to the north and east and Israel to the south, while Cyprus li ...
. Two
bazooka Bazooka () is the common name for a Man-portable anti-tank systems, man-portable recoilless Anti-tank warfare, anti-tank rocket launcher weapon, widely deployed by the United States Army, especially during World War II. Also referred to as the ...
shells were fired at the bus. The attack was one of the first carried out by the PFLP-GC. The
Ma'alot massacre The Ma'alot massacreSources describing the event as a "massacre": * "The day after the Ma'alot massacre, condemned by Pope Paul VI and most Western leaders as 'an evil outrage…'" Frank Gervasi. ''Thunder Over the Mediterranean'', McKay, 1975 ...
in May 1974 involved a two-day hostage-taking of 115 people which ended in the deaths of over 25 hostages. It began when three armed members of the
Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine The Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine (DFLP; ar, الجبهة الديموقراطية لتحرير فلسطين, ''al-Jabha al-Dīmūqrāṭiyya li-Taḥrīr Filasṭīn'') is a secular Palestinian Marxist–Leninist organi ...
(DFLP) entered the Netiv Meir Elementary School, where they took more than 115 people (including 105 children) hostage on May 15, 1974, in Ma'alot. The hostage-takers soon issued demands for the release of 23 Palestinian militants from Israeli prisons, or else they would kill the students. On the second day of the standoff, a unit of the
Golani Brigade The 1st "Golani" Brigade ( he, חֲטִיבַת גּוֹלָנִי) is an Israeli military infantry brigade that is subordinated to the 36th Division and traditionally associated with the Northern Command. It is one of the five infantry brigade ...
stormed the building. During the takeover, the hostage-takers killed the children with grenades and automatic weapons. Ultimately, 25 hostages, including 22 children, were killed and 68 more were injured. The
Dolphinarium discotheque suicide bombing On 1 June 2001, a Hamas-affiliated Islamist terrorist blew himself up outside the Dolphinarium discotheque on the beachfront in Tel Aviv, Israel, killing 21 Israelis, 16 of whom were teenagers. The majority of the victims were Israeli teenage ...
was a terrorist attack by on June 1, 2001 in which a
suicide bomber A suicide attack is any violent Strike (attack), attack, usually entailing the attacker detonating an explosive, where the attacker has suicide, accepted their own death as a direct result of the attacking method used. Suicide attacks have oc ...
Saeed Hotari, linked to the
Palestinian Palestinians ( ar, الفلسطينيون, ; he, פָלַסְטִינִים, ) or Palestinian people ( ar, الشعب الفلسطيني, label=none, ), also referred to as Palestinian Arabs ( ar, الفلسطينيين العرب, label=non ...
group
Hamas Hamas (, ; , ; an acronym of , "Islamic Resistance Movement") is a Palestinian Sunni-Islamic fundamentalist, militant, and nationalist organization. It has a social service wing, Dawah, and a military wing, the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Bri ...
, blew himself up outside a discotheque on a beachfront in
Tel Aviv Tel Aviv-Yafo ( he, תֵּל־אָבִיב-יָפוֹ, translit=Tēl-ʾĀvīv-Yāfō ; ar, تَلّ أَبِيب – يَافَا, translit=Tall ʾAbīb-Yāfā, links=no), often referred to as just Tel Aviv, is the most populous city in the G ...
, Israel, killing 21 Israeli teenagers and injuring 132. The
Mercaz HaRav massacre The 2008 Jerusalem yeshiva attack was a mass shooting attack that occurred on 6 March 2008, in which a lone Palestinian gunman shot multiple students at the Mercaz HaRav yeshiva, a religious school in Jerusalem, after which the gunman himself w ...
, also called the Mercaz HaRav shooting, was an attack that occurred on March 6, 2008, in which a lone Palestinian gunman shot multiple students at the
Mercaz HaRav Mercaz HaRav (officially, he, מרכז הרב - הישיבה המרכזית העולמית, "The Center of Rabbi ook- the Central Universal Yeshiva") is a national-religious yeshiva in Jerusalem, founded in 1924 by Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi Abraham ...
yeshiva A yeshiva (; he, ישיבה, , sitting; pl. , or ) is a traditional Jewish educational institution focused on the study of Rabbinic literature, primarily the Talmud and halacha (Jewish law), while Torah and Jewish philosophy are s ...
, a school in
Jerusalem Jerusalem (; he, יְרוּשָׁלַיִם ; ar, القُدس ) (combining the Biblical and common usage Arabic names); grc, Ἱερουσαλήμ/Ἰεροσόλυμα, Hierousalḗm/Hierosóluma; hy, Երուսաղեմ, Erusałēm. i ...
. Eight students and the perpetrator were killed. Eleven more were wounded, five of them placed in serious to critical condition. Other terrorist attacks targeting children included the
Itamar attack The Itamar attack, * * also called the Itamar massacre, was a terrorist attack on an Israeli family in the Israeli settlement of Itamar in the West Bank that took place on 11 March 2011, in which five members of the same family were murder ...
in which six children and their parents were murdered in their beds, including a three-month-old infant, and the 2011 Shaar HaNegev school bus attack in which Hamas militants in the Gaza Strip fired a Kornet laser-guided anti-tank missile over the border at an Israeli school bus, killing one child.School bus attack may spark Gaza war
, ''The Australian'' April 9, 2011


Legal issues

In 2010
Palestinian National Authority The Palestinian National Authority (PA or PNA; ar, السلطة الوطنية الفلسطينية '), commonly known as the Palestinian Authority and officially the State of Palestine,
issued a "Report on the Implementation of the Convention on the Rights of the Child in the Occupied Palestinian Territory", i.e., the West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza and noted the Authority's lack of jurisdiction over these areas and the Israel "closure regime", the "Israeli Wall of Annexation and Expansion" and the many checkpoints Israel has set up within the occupied territories. All make it difficult for Palestinians to stop Israeli violations of the rights of Palestinian children.Palestinian National Authority Report on the Implementation of the Convention on the Rights of the Child in the Occupied Palestinian Territory
, December 2010, at the
Save the Children The Save the Children Fund, commonly known as Save the Children, is an international non-governmental organization established in the United Kingdom in 1919 to improve the lives of children through better education, health care, and economic ...
website.
According to the Israeli military and prison service, at the end of February 2018 there were 356 Palestinian minors (defined as before 18th birthday) held as Israeli security detainees and prisoners. Applicable to Israelis and Palestinians is the
Convention on the Rights of the Child The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (commonly abbreviated as the CRC or UNCRC) is an international human rights treaty which sets out the civil, political, economic, social, health and cultural rights of children. The Con ...
, a human rights treaty setting out the civil, political, economic, social, health and cultural rights of children. The Convention defines a child as any human being under the age of eighteen, unless the state itself defines the
age of majority The age of majority is the threshold of legal adulthood as recognized or declared in law. It is the moment when minors cease to be considered such and assume legal control over their persons, actions, and decisions, thus terminating the contr ...
as an earlier age. Israel ratified the Convention on the Rights of the Child in 1991.Or Kashti
UNICEF: Israel negligent in guarding children's rights
, ''
Haaretz ''Haaretz'' ( , originally ''Ḥadshot Haaretz'' – , ) is an Israeli newspaper. It was founded in 1918, making it the longest running newspaper currently in print in Israel, and is now published in both Hebrew and English in the Berliner f ...
'', November 21, 2010.
Although Palestine did not have the status of a state, in 1995
Yassir Arafat Mohammed Abdel Rahman Abdel Raouf al-Qudwa al-Husseini (4 / 24 August 1929 – 11 November 2004), popularly known as Yasser Arafat ( , ; ar, محمد ياسر عبد الرحمن عبد الرؤوف عرفات القدوة الحسيني, Mu ...
, as the representative of the
Palestine Liberation Organization The Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO; ar, منظمة التحرير الفلسطينية, ') is a Palestinian nationalism, Palestinian nationalist political and militant organization founded in 1964 with the initial purpose of establ ...
, signed the Convention. The internationally accepted definition of children, codified in the
United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (commonly abbreviated as the CRC or UNCRC) is an international human rights treaty which sets out the civil, political, economic, social, health and cultural rights of children. The Con ...
(CRC), defines children as individuals under the age of 18. Since 1991 Israel has signed and ratified the CRC and applies the definition to Israeli children. However, in the Occupied Territories Israel defines as minors only Palestinians who are under the age of 16. Some leaders of the major Palestinian armed groups also state they consider children of 16 to be adults. According to the 1971 Israeli Youth Law, criminal responsibility is set at 12 years of age and over. The law states that children under that age may not be arrested, and that children older than that age must not be interrogated unless their parents and their lawyer is present. The Israeli human rights monitoring group
B'Tselem B'Tselem ( he, בצלם, , " in the image of od) is a Jerusalem-based non-profit organization whose stated goals are to document human rights violations in the Israeli-occupied Palestinian territories, combat any denial of the existence of su ...
states that the law does not officially apply to Palestinian children in the Occupied Territories, who are subject to Israeli military law, but that the
military court A court-martial or court martial (plural ''courts-martial'' or ''courts martial'', as "martial" is a postpositive adjective) is a military court or a trial conducted in such a court. A court-martial is empowered to determine the guilt of memb ...
has recommended the provisions should be taken into consideration. According to
Gideon Levy Gideon Levy ( he, גדעון לוי; born 2 June 1953) is an Israeli journalist and author. Levy writes opinion pieces and a weekly column for the newspaper ''Haaretz'' that often focus on the Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territories. ...
, these provisions are ignored in practice. A
UNICEF UNICEF (), originally called the United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund in full, now officially United Nations Children's Fund, is an agency of the United Nations responsible for providing Humanitarianism, humanitarian and Devel ...
report has stated that, "Ill-treatment of Palestinian children in the Israeli military detention system appears to be widespread, systematic and institutionalized," and that, "In no other country are children systematically tried by juvenile military courts."Gideon Levy and Alex Leva
Aged eight, wearing a Mickey Mouse sweatshirt, and placed in Israeli custody
, ''
Haaretz ''Haaretz'' ( , originally ''Ḥadshot Haaretz'' – , ) is an Israeli newspaper. It was founded in 1918, making it the longest running newspaper currently in print in Israel, and is now published in both Hebrew and English in the Berliner f ...
'', March 29, 2013.


Treatment of Palestinian children by the IDF

The Code of Conduct of the Israeli Defense Forces explicitly prohibits targeting non-combatants and dictates proportional force, stating, in part, that "The soldier shall make use of his weaponry and power only for the fulfillment of the mission and solely to the extent required; he will maintain his humanity even in combat. The soldier shall not employ his weaponry and power in order to harm non-combatants or prisoners of war, and shall do all he can to avoid harming their lives, body, honor and property." However, Philip E. Veerman in an academic study found that the reaction of Israeli police and military against Palestinian violence was so strong that it "practically eliminates the chances of effective training directed at the protection of children." Many children are raised in refugee camps, and their situation has been described by Daoud Kuttub in the following way:
'Unlike children in refugee camps elsewhere, children born in refugee camps under occupation drink their mothers' milk while their camp is under curfew; they wake up in the middle of the night to the sound of rubber bullets and rumors of a possible settler attack. As they grow up, they quickly learn the political lesson of the occupation. Soldiers, batons, tear gas, rubber bullets, arrests, torture, curfews, closure of camp entrances,
administrative detention Administrative detention is arrest and detention of individuals by the state without trial. A number of jurisdictions claim that it is done for security reasons. Many countries claim to use administrative detention as a means to combat terrorism ...
, and town arrests are all prominent entries in the refugee camps' daily dictionary.'


Violence against children

Each year approximately 700 Palestinian children aged 12 to 17, the great majority of them boys, are arrested, interrogated and detained by Israeli army, police and security agents. An estimated 7,000 children have been detained , interrogated, prosecuted and/or imprisoned within the Israeli military justice system – an average of two children each day. Israel, after it emerged that even 12-year-old children were prosecuted in adult
military court A court-martial or court martial (plural ''courts-martial'' or ''courts martial'', as "martial" is a postpositive adjective) is a military court or a trial conducted in such a court. A court-martial is empowered to determine the guilt of memb ...
s, instituted in September 2009 a juvenile military court, the only one known to exist in the world, which however uses the same staff and rooms as the military courts where Palestinian adults are put on trial. Two years later (27 September 2011) Military Order 1676 stipulated that only youths 18 and over could be tried in adult military courts. However the sentencing protocols applied to the 16–17 year old bracket remain those applied to adults. Most prosecutions of teenagers concern stone-throwing which is an offence under Section 212 of Military Order 1651, and carried a penalty of up to 10 years imprisonment, theoretically applicable to children between 14 and 15. Conviction for throwing anything at a moving vehicle with intent to harm carries a maximum penalty of 20 years. The analysis of cases monitored by
UNICEF UNICEF (), originally called the United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund in full, now officially United Nations Children's Fund, is an agency of the United Nations responsible for providing Humanitarianism, humanitarian and Devel ...
identified examples of practices that amount to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment according to the
Convention on the Rights of the Child The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (commonly abbreviated as the CRC or UNCRC) is an international human rights treaty which sets out the civil, political, economic, social, health and cultural rights of children. The Con ...
(ratified by Israel in 1991 and the PA in 1995) and the
Convention against Torture The Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (commonly known as the United Nations Convention Against Torture (UNCAT)) is an international human rights treaty under the review of the United Nation ...
. It is common for many children caught up in the system to be aggressively woken in the middle of the night by many armed soldiers and, tied and blindfolded, transported to Israeli settlements or official interrogation centres. Few children are informed of their rights to legal counsel, or their right to avoid self-incrimination. Confessions from children are extracted by a mixture of sleep-deprivation, threats –of death threats against them or their families, sexual assault and solitary confinement- and physical violence. Confessions to be signed are often written in Hebrew, which most Palestinian children do not know. Once the interrogation is finished, the children, in leg chains, shackles and prison uniforms, are taken before a military court where their confessions, extorted under duress, form the primary evidence for the prosecution. Sentences are served in three prisons, two of which are inside Israel, and critics argue that their incarceration in Israel violates the article 76 of the Geneva Convention, which states that "protected persons accused of offences shall be detained in the occupied country, and if convicted they shall serve their sentences therein." According to
John Dugard Christopher John Robert Dugard (born 23 August 1936 in Fort Beaufort), known as John Dugard, is a South African professor of international law. His main academic specializations are in Roman-Dutch law, public international law, jurisprudence, hum ...
, the UN Special Rapporteur, regarding the early years of the Al-Aqsa Intifada (2000-2002), most child victims were not participating in demonstrations when they were killed by tank shelling, artillery fire and helicopter gunships. Since the Second Intifada,
UNICEF UNICEF (), originally called the United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund in full, now officially United Nations Children's Fund, is an agency of the United Nations responsible for providing Humanitarianism, humanitarian and Devel ...
(The United Nations Children's Fund),
Amnesty International Amnesty International (also referred to as Amnesty or AI) is an international non-governmental organization focused on human rights, with its headquarters in the United Kingdom. The organization says it has more than ten million members and sup ...
, B'Tselem and individuals such as the British writer Derek Summerfield, have called for Israel to protect children from violence in accordance with the
Geneva conventions upright=1.15, Original document in single pages, 1864 The Geneva Conventions are four treaties, and three additional protocols, that establish international legal standards for humanitarian treatment in war. The singular term ''Geneva Conven ...
. The European Union has linked the suspension of Israel/Europe trade agreement talks to human rights issues, especially in regards to children. In 2012, Breaking the Silence, an organization founded by former Israeli soldiers whose purpose is to expose alleged abuses committed by the
Israeli Defense Forces Israeli may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to the State of Israel * Israelis, citizens or permanent residents of the State of Israel * Modern Hebrew, a language * ''Israeli'' (newspaper), published from 2006 to 2008 * Guni Israeli ...
released a booklet of witness reports written by more than 30 former Israeli soldiers. These reports document of Palestinian children being beaten, intimidated, humiliated, verbally abused and injured by Israeli soldiers. Eran Efrati, a former IDF commander on the West Bank has said that ill-treatment of arrested children is routine. He himself admits to having arrested children aged 11 and over as though they were adults, with handcuffs and blindfolds:
'When the kid is sitting there in the base, I didn't do it, but nobody is thinking of him as a kid, you know—if there is someone blindfolded and handcuffed, he's probably done something really bad. It's OK to slap him, it's OK to spit on him, it's OK to kick him sometimes. It doesn't really matter.''Israeli troops 'ill-treat kids','
BBC News BBC News is an operational business division of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) responsible for the gathering and broadcasting of news and current affairs in the UK and around the world. The department is the world's largest broadca ...
6 August 2014.
700 of the 9,000 Palestinians arrested in 2013 were children. An Israeli Defense Forces spokesperson said the Breaking the Silence group had declined to provide the IDF with testimonies for verification, and Danny Lamm, president of the Executive Council of Australian Jewry, said these types of testimonies are "anonymous ... devoid of critical detail and untested by any kind of cross-questioning." Between 2014 and 2015, the military prosecuted indictments against 1,046 Palestinian minors. The non-governmental organization, Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor, Accuse the Israeli forces of orchestring "their actions" to "humiliate and terrorize Palestinian children".


Child detention

In September 2009, after documentation emerged showing Palestinians children as young as 12 were prosecuted in adult
military court A court-martial or court martial (plural ''courts-martial'' or ''courts martial'', as "martial" is a postpositive adjective) is a military court or a trial conducted in such a court. A court-martial is empowered to determine the guilt of memb ...
s, Israel established a juvenile military court, 'the first and only juvenile military court in operation in the world.' Military Order 1651 establishes a maximum 6 months sentence for children aged 12–13, and 12 months for juniors aged 14–15, unless the offence involves throwing stones at persons or property with the intent to damage, in which case 10 years imprisonment is the maximum penalty. In one case a 5-year-old child has been detailed on allegations he threw stones in Hebron. The IDF said that the boy had endangered passers-by and that soldiers only accompanied him to his parents. It stated that the child was not arrested and no charges were filed. A separate study, conducted from 2005 until 2010 was released in mid-2011 by the Jerusalem-based non-profit
B'Tselem B'Tselem ( he, בצלם, , " in the image of od) is a Jerusalem-based non-profit organization whose stated goals are to document human rights violations in the Israeli-occupied Palestinian territories, combat any denial of the existence of su ...
, found that the actions of the IDF potentially violated the
Convention on the Rights of the Child The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (commonly abbreviated as the CRC or UNCRC) is an international human rights treaty which sets out the civil, political, economic, social, health and cultural rights of children. The Con ...
and the
Fourth Geneva Convention The Geneva Convention relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War, more commonly referred to as the Fourth Geneva Convention and abbreviated as GCIV, is one of the four treaties of the Geneva Conventions. It was adopted in Augus ...
. According to a March 2013 report by the
United Nations Children's Fund UNICEF (), originally called the United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund in full, now officially United Nations Children's Fund, is an agency of the United Nations responsible for providing humanitarian and developmental aid to ...
("UNICEF"), Israel has arrested some 7,000 Palestinian children; 18 of 27 arrested in Hebron in March 2013 were below the age of 12. The report was based on 400 cases documented since 2009. It stated that the Palestinian children who are detained by the Israeli military are subjected to "widespread, systematic and institutionalized" ill treatment in violation of international law. UNICEF estimated that in the
West Bank The West Bank ( ar, الضفة الغربية, translit=aḍ-Ḍiffah al-Ġarbiyyah; he, הגדה המערבית, translit=HaGadah HaMaʽaravit, also referred to by some Israelis as ) is a landlocked territory near the coast of the Mediter ...
IDF and Israeli security services annually arrest around 700 youths between 12 and 17 years old. The report supported claims that the arrests were often made, without notice, in private homes at night. It reports that children are blindfolded, painfully restrained, and subjected to physical and verbal abuse while being detained, sometimes in solitary confinement. The report further claims that, once in detention, they are interrogated and coerced into confession, without immediate access to a legal counsel or family members. Signed confessions are typically typed in Hebrew, which few Palestinian minors can read. As of January 2013 Israeli military prisons held 233 males under 18, 31 under the age of 16. Additionally children are shackled during court appearances and made to serve sentences in Israel. UNICEF stated these findings "amount to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment according to the Convention on the Rights of the Child and the Convention against Torture". About 60 percent of arrested minors are charged with throwing rocks at soldiers or passing cars, which the IDF regards as a form of terrorism as it has led to the death and injury of Israelis, including of children. The UNICEF report noted that Israel had made some positive changes over recent years, such as hand tying measures that do not cause pain or injury. It urged Israel to refrain from blindfolding minors and holding them in solitary confinement, to permit an attorney or family member to attend interrogations, and to record interrogations to document any false claims of abuse. Israel's Foreign Ministry said Israel's military was already making changes to cooperate with the United Nations, including reducing holding time before seeing a judge to 48 hours, telling parents about arrest of children, and informing children of their right to consult a lawyer. UNICEF replied that the changes were insufficiently specific. Israeli Ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor stated that "Israel will study the conclusions and will work to implement them through ongoing cooperation with UNICEF, whose work we value and respect". In October 2013, UNICEF reported that the IDF was introducing changes in its arrest of minors in a pilot-test programme, but according to ''Haaretz'' the policy had not at that date been implemented and was still under study. January 2015, Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor has issued a press release about Israeli detention of a
Palestinian Palestinians ( ar, الفلسطينيون, ; he, פָלַסְטִינִים, ) or Palestinian people ( ar, الشعب الفلسطيني, label=none, ), also referred to as Palestinian Arabs ( ar, الفلسطينيين العرب, label=non ...
girl. The monitor said that Malak Al-Khatib, 14 year old-Palestinian girl, has been imprisoned by Israeli authorities for 22 consecutive days without contact with her parents, and has just been sentenced to serve another month along with a stiff fine on her parents. In addition, the monitor said that another four
child A child ( : children) is a human being between the stages of birth and puberty, or between the developmental period of infancy and puberty. The legal definition of ''child'' generally refers to a minor, otherwise known as a person younger ...
ren as young as 11 were recently held for four hours under threat of detention and death. The Euro-Med Monitor has condemned Israel's policy of detaining children and subjecting them to abusive and inhumane treatment.


Human shields

Amnesty International's report into the 2008 Gaza War stated that they had found instances in which the IDF endangered the lives of civilians, including children, by using them as
human shield A human shield is a non-combatant (or a group of non-combatants) who either volunteers or is forced to shield a legitimate military target in order to deter the enemy from attacking it. The use of human shields as a resistance measure was popula ...
s. The report discussed examples such as "forcing them to remain in or near houses which they took over and used as military positions. Some were forced to carry out dangerous tasks such as inspecting properties or objects suspected of being booby-trapped." The Israeli military denied the allegations saying "The IDF operated in accordance with the rules of war and did the utmost to minimize harm to civilians uninvolved in combat. The IDF's use of weapons conforms to international law." Israel's
Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center The Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center (ITIC), also known as Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center in honor of Meir Amit, is an Israeli-based research group with ties to the Israel Defense Forces and support from the ...
and the Israeli
Ministry of Foreign Affairs In many countries, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs is the government department responsible for the state's diplomacy, bilateral, and multilateral relations affairs as well as for providing support for a country's citizens who are abroad. The entit ...
likewise accused Hamas and other militant groups of using children human shields during the Gaza war. In 2010, two IDF soldiers were convicted of 'excess authority' and 'conduct unbecoming' for using a 9-year-old Palestinian child as a human shield to open packages they suspected of being booby trapped during the Gaza War. Both soldiers received three months probation and a demotion in rank. The Israeli Deputy Military Advocate for Operational Affairs commented that "the defendants did not seek to humiliate or degrade the boy."


Settler violence


Palestinian militant misuse of children

Historically, in the final years of the
Ottoman Empire The Ottoman Empire, * ; is an archaic version. The definite article forms and were synonymous * and el, Оθωμανική Αυτοκρατορία, Othōmanikē Avtokratoria, label=none * info page on book at Martin Luther University) ...
, Palestinian children and youths often figured at the forefront of struggles to oppose Jewish immigration into Palestine. According to David M. Rosen, from the beginning of the
conflict Conflict may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Films * ''Conflict'' (1921 film), an American silent film directed by Stuart Paton * ''Conflict'' (1936 film), an American boxing film starring John Wayne * ''Conflict'' (1937 film) ...
, the belief developed among militants that youth have a duty to sacrifice themselves. David M. Rosen
''Armies of the Young: Child Soldiers in War and Terrorism''
Rutgers University Press Rutgers University Press (RUP) is a nonprofit academic publishing house, operating in New Brunswick, New Jersey under the auspices of Rutgers University. History Rutgers University Press, a nonprofit academic publishing house operating in New B ...
, 2005 p.91.
With the emergence of
Fatah Fatah ( ar, فتح '), formerly the Palestinian National Liberation Movement, is a Palestinian nationalist social democratic political party and the largest faction of the confederated multi-party Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) and ...
in the Palestinian diaspora, the PLO created youth groups like the ''Zahrat'' (flowers) for girls and ''Ashbal'' (lion cubs) for boys in communities of exiled Palestinians. The aim was to provide them with military training as part of a programme to strength a Palestinian national self-awareness within the context of a revolutionary culture. When the
First Intifada The First Intifada, or First Palestinian Intifada (also known simply as the intifada or intifadah),The word ''intifada'' () is an Arabic word meaning "uprising". Its strict Arabic transliteration is '. was a sustained series of Palestinian ...
broke out, a culture of linking the Palestinian stone-throwing child to a
shahid ''Shaheed'' ( ,  ,   ; pa, ਸ਼ਹੀਦ) denotes a martyr in Islam. The word is used frequently in the Quran in the generic sense of "witness" but only once in the sense of "martyr" (i.e. one who dies for his faith); ...
quickly developed. In the five years running up to the outbreak of the
Second Intifada The Second Intifada ( ar, الانتفاضة الثانية, ; he, האינתיפאדה השנייה, ), also known as the Al-Aqsa Intifada ( ar, انتفاضة الأقصى, label=none, '), was a major Palestinian uprising against Israel. ...
, the
Palestinian Authority The Palestinian National Authority (PA or PNA; ar, السلطة الوطنية الفلسطينية '), commonly known as the Palestinian Authority and officially the State of Palestine,
created 19 paramilitary training camps for teenagers. The drills include mock kidnappings of Israeli political figures, attacks on military posts and training with Kalashnikovs. Testimonies from young people highlighted an agenda of radicalization. Shaul Kimhi and Shmuel Even, writing of events down to 2003, have argued that children and youths who engage in terrorist acts form part of a fourth category by motivation, which they define as "the exploited".Shaul Kimhi and Shmuel Even
« Who Are the Palestinian Suicide Bombers? »
''
Terrorism and Political Violence ''Terrorism and Political Violence'' is a peer-reviewed academic journal covering terrorism and counter-terrorism published by Routledge. It was established in 1989 by David C. Rapoport (University of California, Los Angeles), who remains editor-i ...
'', vol. 6, no 2, September 2003 pp.28–34 p.31.
In October 2000, the
Grand Mufti The Grand Mufti (also called Chief Mufti, State Mufti and Supreme Mufti) is the head of regional muftis, Islamic jurisconsults, of a state. The office originated in the early modern era in the Ottoman empire and has been later adopted in a num ...
Ekrima Sa'id Sabri Sheikh Ekrima Sa'id Sabri ( ar, عكرمة سعيد صبري) (born 1939) was the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem and Palestine from October 1994 to July 2006. He was appointed by Yasser Arafat. Mahmoud Abbas removed Sabri as mufti in July 2006, report ...
incited child suicide bombers when questioned about suicide attacks, he declared: “The younger the martyr, the more I respect him”. The participation of children in acts of violence intensified during the second Intifada, as many children were recruited into Palestinian armed groups. Daphne Burdman (2003) describes a process in which young people were encouraged to die as martyrs through incitement of the Palestinian educational system. According to the
Coalition to Stop the Use of Child Soldiers Child Soldiers International, formerly the Coalition to Stop the Use of Child Soldiers, was a UK-based non-governmental organization that worked to prevent the recruitment, use and exploitation of children by armed forces and groups. As of 7 June ...
' "2004 Global Report on the Use of Child Soldiers" there was "no evidence of systematic recruitment of children by Palestinian armed groups."Child Soldiers Global Report 2004
Coalition to Stop the Use of Child Soldiers Child Soldiers International, formerly the Coalition to Stop the Use of Child Soldiers, was a UK-based non-governmental organization that worked to prevent the recruitment, use and exploitation of children by armed forces and groups. As of 7 June ...
, pp. 292, 304
The report noted that "children are used as messengers and couriers, and in some cases as fighters and suicide bombers in attacks on Israeli soldiers and civilians. All the main political groups involve children in this way, including Fatah, Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine." In total, there were at least 9 incidents where children were involved in suicide attacks or other violent militant acts. According to
Human Rights Watch Human Rights Watch (HRW) is an international non-governmental organization, headquartered in New York City, that conducts research and advocacy on human rights. The group pressures governments, policy makers, companies, and individual human r ...
, in 2004, the major Palestinian armed groups, including
Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade The al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades () is a coalition of Palestinian armed groups in the West Bank. The organization has been designated as a terrorist organization by Israel, the European Union, Canada, Japan, New Zealand, and the United States. L ...
, the
Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine ( ar, الجبهة الشعبية لتحرير فلسطين, translit=al-Jabhah al-Sha`biyyah li-Taḥrīr Filasṭīn, PFLP) is a secular Palestinian Marxist–Leninist and revolutionary soci ...
, Islamic Jihad, and
Hamas Hamas (, ; , ; an acronym of , "Islamic Resistance Movement") is a Palestinian Sunni-Islamic fundamentalist, militant, and nationalist organization. It has a social service wing, Dawah, and a military wing, the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Bri ...
"have publicly disavowed the use of children in military operations, but those stated policies have not always been implemented." In part this is because some leaders state they consider children of 16 to be adults. In 2005
Amnesty International Amnesty International (also referred to as Amnesty or AI) is an international non-governmental organization focused on human rights, with its headquarters in the United Kingdom. The organization says it has more than ten million members and sup ...
condemned the use of children by Palestinian militant groups saying: "Palestinian armed groups have repeatedly shown total disregard for the most fundamental human rights, notably the right to life, by deliberately targeting Israeli civilians and by using Palestinian children in armed attacks."


Human shields

During the
Second Intifada The Second Intifada ( ar, الانتفاضة الثانية, ; he, האינתיפאדה השנייה, ), also known as the Al-Aqsa Intifada ( ar, انتفاضة الأقصى, label=none, '), was a major Palestinian uprising against Israel. ...
(2000–2005) ''
Haaretz ''Haaretz'' ( , originally ''Ḥadshot Haaretz'' – , ) is an Israeli newspaper. It was founded in 1918, making it the longest running newspaper currently in print in Israel, and is now published in both Hebrew and English in the Berliner f ...
'' reported that Palestinian militant gunmen used civilians and children as
human shield A human shield is a non-combatant (or a group of non-combatants) who either volunteers or is forced to shield a legitimate military target in order to deter the enemy from attacking it. The use of human shields as a resistance measure was popula ...
s by surrounding themselves with children while shooting at
IDF IDF or idf may refer to: Defence forces * Irish Defence Forces * Israel Defense Forces *Iceland Defense Force, of the US Armed Forces, 1951-2006 * Indian Defence Force, a part-time force, 1917 Organizations * Israeli Diving Federation * Interac ...
forces. In a 2006 incident the
Israeli Air Force The Israeli Air Force (IAF; he, זְרוֹעַ הָאֲוִיר וְהֶחָלָל, Zroa HaAvir VeHahalal, tl, "Air and Space Arm", commonly known as , ''Kheil HaAvir'', "Air Corps") operates as the aerial warfare branch of the Israel Defense ...
warned Mohammed Weil Baroud, a Palestinian leader accused by Israel of firing
Qassam rocket The Qassam rocket ( ar, صاروخ القسام ''Ṣārūkh al-Qassām''; also ''Kassam'') is a simple, steel artillery rocket developed and deployed by the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades, the military arm of Hamas. These rockets cannot be fired ...
s at Israel, to evacuate his home in
Beit Lahia Beit Lahia or Beit Lahiya ( ar, بيت لاهيا) is a city in the Gaza Strip north of Jabalia, near Beit Hanoun and the 1949 Armistice Line with Israel. According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, the city had a population of 59 ...
in the Gaza Strip in advance of an Israeli
airstrike An airstrike, air strike or air raid is an offensive operation carried out by aircraft. Air strikes are delivered from aircraft such as blimps, balloons, fighters, heavy bombers, ground attack aircraft, attack helicopters and drones. The offic ...
. Instead, hundreds of Palestinians, including many women and children, gathered outside Baroud's house. Israel suspended the airstrike out of fear that the civilians would be killed or injured. A senior Hamas official said the new tactic was taken because in previous months Israel has destroyed 58 houses and more than 240 people had been left homeless. After Israel called off the strike, another Palestinian leader said: "We have won. From now on we will form human chains around every house that is threatened with demolition." In October 2009, local Palestinians confirmed that Hamas had fired at Israeli troops from adjacent a UN school for girls where hundreds of Palestinians had sought refuge, leading to civilian casualties. During the November 2012
Operation Pillar of Defense In November 2012, the Israel Defense Forces launched Operation Pillar of Defense ( he, עַמּוּד עָנָן, ''ʿAmúd ʿAnán'', literally: "Pillar of Cloud") which was an eight-day campaign in the Hamas-governed Gaza Strip, which bega ...
, Hamas was accused of launching rockets from hospitals, schools, mosques and playgrounds. This practice was condemned by Human Rights Watch, the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), and the IDF.


Child suicide bombers

According to the
Coalition to Stop the Use of Child Soldiers Child Soldiers International, formerly the Coalition to Stop the Use of Child Soldiers, was a UK-based non-governmental organization that worked to prevent the recruitment, use and exploitation of children by armed forces and groups. As of 7 June ...
"2004 Global Report on the Use of Child Soldiers", there were at least nine documented suicide attacks involving Palestinian minors between October 2000 and March 2004. In 2004, ''The Guardian'' reported that the Israeli military "accused a faction of Yasser Arafat's Fatah movement of using an 11-year-old boy as an unwitting human bomb after the child was discovered carrying explosive through an army checkpoint in Nablus. In 2009, a 14-year-old was captured by Israeli soldiers and told of being given $23 and a suicide bomber's vest. His family said he was gullible and easily manipulated. Shafiq Masalha, a clinical psychologist who teaches at
Tel Aviv University Tel Aviv University (TAU) ( he, אוּנִיבֶרְסִיטַת תֵּל אָבִיב, ''Universitat Tel Aviv'') is a public research university in Tel Aviv, Israel. With over 30,000 students, it is the largest university in the country. Locate ...
, wrote in 2004 that 15 percent of Palestinian children dreamt of becoming suicide bombers. According to Eyad Sarraj, Palestinian psychiatrist and director of the Gaza Community Mental Health Program, a survey by his program found that 36 percent of Palestinians over 12 aspired to die "a martyr's death" fighting Israel. Former UN Under-Secretary General
Olara Otunnu Olara A. Otunnu (born 6 September 1950) is a Ugandan politician, diplomat, and lawyer. He was President of the Uganda People's Congress (UPC), a political party, from 2010 to 2015 and stood as the party's candidate in the 2011 presidential elect ...
stated in 2003: "We have witnessed both ends of these acts: children have been used as suicide bombers and children have been killed by suicide bombings. I call on the Palestinian authorities to do everything within their powers to stop all participation by children in this conflict."


Casualty figures

Below is a summary of tables of child fatalities from 1987 to 2022 presented by
B'Tselem B'Tselem ( he, בצלם, , " in the image of od) is a Jerusalem-based non-profit organization whose stated goals are to document human rights violations in the Israeli-occupied Palestinian territories, combat any denial of the existence of su ...
. It provides an overview of killings of Israeli children by Palestinian militants and of Palestinian children, largely by Israeli security forces. Per the below, the Israeli government disputes some of these numbers, especially regarding the Gaza War. The
First Intifada The First Intifada, or First Palestinian Intifada (also known simply as the intifada or intifadah),The word ''intifada'' () is an Arabic word meaning "uprising". Its strict Arabic transliteration is '. was a sustained series of Palestinian ...
of mass protests and rioting by
Palestinians Palestinians ( ar, الفلسطينيون, ; he, פָלַסְטִינִים, ) or Palestinian people ( ar, الشعب الفلسطيني, label=none, ), also referred to as Palestinian Arabs ( ar, الفلسطينيين العرب, label=non ...
in the occupied
West Bank The West Bank ( ar, الضفة الغربية, translit=aḍ-Ḍiffah al-Ġarbiyyah; he, הגדה המערבית, translit=HaGadah HaMaʽaravit, also referred to by some Israelis as ) is a landlocked territory near the coast of the Mediter ...
,
East Jerusalem East Jerusalem (, ; , ) is the sector of Jerusalem that was held by Jordan during the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, as opposed to the western sector of the city, West Jerusalem, which was held by Israel. Jerusalem was envisaged as a separat ...
and Gaza started in 1987, and children frequently participated. In an article in the London Review of Books, American professors
John Mearsheimer John Joseph Mearsheimer (; born December 14, 1947) is an American political scientist and international relations scholar, who belongs to the realist school of thought. He is the R. Wendell Harrison Distinguished Service Professor at the Univers ...
and
Stephen Walt Stephen Martin Walt (born July 2, 1955) is the Robert and Renee Belfer Professor of International relations at the Harvard Kennedy School at Harvard University and a political scientist. A member of the realist school of international relations ...
claimed that the
Israel Defense Forces The Israel Defense Forces (IDF; he, צְבָא הַהֲגָנָה לְיִשְׂרָאֵל , ), alternatively referred to by the Hebrew-language acronym (), is the national military of the Israel, State of Israel. It consists of three servic ...
("IDF") encouraged troops to break protesters' bones. The Swedish branch of
Save the Children The Save the Children Fund, commonly known as Save the Children, is an international non-governmental organization established in the United Kingdom in 1919 to improve the lives of children through better education, health care, and economic ...
estimated that during the first year of the intifada, between 23,600 and 29,900 children required medical treatment for such beating, tear gas, and gunfire injuries and that nearly a third were under the age of ten. The Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs lists 24 Israeli child fatalities between 1993 and 1999. As the B'Tselem summaries show, from the outbreak of the
Second Intifada The Second Intifada ( ar, الانتفاضة الثانية, ; he, האינתיפאדה השנייה, ), also known as the Al-Aqsa Intifada ( ar, انتفاضة الأقصى, label=none, '), was a major Palestinian uprising against Israel. ...
starting in 2000, through the 2008–2009 Gaza War, to September 2012 there were a greater number of child fatalities. A study by the
International Institute for Counter-Terrorism The International Institute for Counter-Terrorism (ICT) is a conservative Israeli think tank founded in 1996 and located at Reichman University, in Herzliya, Israel. Activities According to ''Foreign Affairs'', ICT presents a conservative Israeli ...
covering September 2001 to January 2005 found that 46 Israelis and 88 Palestinians were below the age of 12 at the time of their deaths."ICT Middleastern Conflict Statistics Project"
. Short summary page with "Breakdown of Fatalities: September 27, 2000 through January 1, 2005."
International Policy Institute for Counter-Terrorism The International Institute for Counter-Terrorism (ICT) is a conservative Israeli think tank founded in 1996 and located at Reichman University, in Herzliya, Israel. Activities According to ''Foreign Affairs'', ICT presents a conservative Israeli ...
.
The youngest victim of violence during the Second Intifada was an Israeli infant who was nine hours old at the time of his death. During the 2004–2009 period there were reports of 30 or more Palestinian children and infants dying, including as a result of
miscarriage Miscarriage, also known in medical terms as a spontaneous abortion and pregnancy loss, is the death of an embryo or fetus before it is able to survive independently. Miscarriage before 6 weeks of gestation is defined by ESHRE as biochemical lo ...
, at
Israeli checkpoint An Israeli checkpoint ( he, מחסום, ''mahsom'', ar, حاجز, ''hajez''), is a barrier erected by the Israeli Security Forces, primarily today part of the system of West Bank closures in the Israeli-occupied West Bank. The checkpoints a ...
s where they were held for long periods of time and denied medical care. Additionally, suicide bombings and other attacks have caused Israeli women to suffer miscarriages, and numerous pregnant women have been killed. Casualties after the three-week Gaza War during the winter of 2008–2009 were disputed. B'Tselem put out a report stating that 320 Palestinian minors under the age of 18 who did not take part in hostilities had been killed by Israeli forces. It was unknown if six other dead children took part, but 19 children between the ages of 16 and 18 who did so also were killed.
Defence for Children International Defence for Children International (DCI) is an independent non-governmental organisation set up in 1979, during the International Year of the Child, to ensure on-going, practical, systematic and concerted international and national action special ...
reported that 352 children had died as a direct result of Israeli military action. The
Palestinian Centre for Human Rights The Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR, ar, المركز الفلسطيني لحقوق الإنسان) is a Palestinian people, Palestinian human rights organization based in Gaza City. It was founded in 1995 by Raji Sourani, who is its d ...
found that 318 Palestinian children been killed.
Al Mezan Center for Human Rights The Al Mezan Center for Human Rights or Al Mezan (ميزان) is a non-governmental organization based in the Jabalia Palestinian refugee camp in the Gaza Strip. Its declared goals are: To promote and protect human rights in the OPT and especiall ...
found that 355 Gazan children were killed by Israeli forces. According to
Amnesty international Amnesty International (also referred to as Amnesty or AI) is an international non-governmental organization focused on human rights, with its headquarters in the United Kingdom. The organization says it has more than ten million members and sup ...
the Palestinian fatalities included "some 300" children. The Israeli military later released its own figures, stating only 89 children under the age of 16 died. According to Elihu D. Richter and Yael Stein of
Hebrew University The Hebrew University of Jerusalem (HUJI; he, הַאוּנִיבֶרְסִיטָה הַעִבְרִית בִּירוּשָׁלַיִם) is a public research university based in Jerusalem, Israel. Co-founded by Albert Einstein and Dr. Chaim Weiz ...
B'Tselem data showed that the overwhelming majority of Palestinian child deaths were male teenagers, suggesting many could have had some role in combat or support for combat. Studies conducted by Israel's
International Institute for Counter-Terrorism The International Institute for Counter-Terrorism (ICT) is a conservative Israeli think tank founded in 1996 and located at Reichman University, in Herzliya, Israel. Activities According to ''Foreign Affairs'', ICT presents a conservative Israeli ...
indicate that 96 percent of Palestinian fatalities during the Second Intifada were male and that the vast majority of child casualties were teenagers. Israeli fatalities do not show any great inclination in regards to gender or age. The
United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) is a United Nations (UN) body established in December 1991 by the General Assembly to strengthen the international response to complex emergencies and natural disaster ...
reported that during "
Operation Pillar of Defense In November 2012, the Israel Defense Forces launched Operation Pillar of Defense ( he, עַמּוּד עָנָן, ''ʿAmúd ʿAnán'', literally: "Pillar of Cloud") which was an eight-day campaign in the Hamas-governed Gaza Strip, which bega ...
", the November 2012 Gaza-Israel clashes, 30 Palestinian children were killed.


Israeli children

About 70 percent of the Israeli children hit were killed in Palestinian suicide bombings. Others were killed in shootings and attacks on cars and buses. In addition, several rapes, kidnappings, and individual murders of Israeli children and teenagers have occurred. Other Israeli children were killed in home invasions, some of them in their own beds or their parents' beds. According to
Amnesty International Amnesty International (also referred to as Amnesty or AI) is an international non-governmental organization focused on human rights, with its headquarters in the United Kingdom. The organization says it has more than ten million members and sup ...
, between 2000 and 2004 during the
First Intifada The First Intifada, or First Palestinian Intifada (also known simply as the intifada or intifadah),The word ''intifada'' () is an Arabic word meaning "uprising". Its strict Arabic transliteration is '. was a sustained series of Palestinian ...
"more than 100 Israeli children... erekilled and hundreds of others injured in suicide bombings, shootings and other attacks carried out by Palestinian armed groups in Israel and in the Occupied Territories." Examples include: * In 2001, a Palestinian
sniper A sniper is a military/paramilitary marksman who engages targets from positions of concealment or at distances exceeding the target's detection capabilities. Snipers generally have specialized training and are equipped with high-precision r ...
opened fire on the Avraham Avino settlement in
Hebron Hebron ( ar, الخليل or ; he, חֶבְרוֹן ) is a Palestinian. city in the southern West Bank, south of Jerusalem. Nestled in the Judaean Mountains, it lies above sea level. The second-largest city in the West Bank (after East J ...
from the Palestinian-controlled Abu Sneineh neighborhood. Ten month-old
Shalhevet Pass The murder of Shalhevet Pass was a shooting attack carried out in Hebron, West Bank, on 26 March 2001, in which a Palestinian sniper killed 10-month-old Israeli infant Shalhevet Pass. The event shocked the Israeli public, partly because an inv ...
was shot in the head and killed while sitting in her stroller; her father was wounded. Israeli leaders said that the sniper deliberately aimed for the baby. * The Sbarro restaurant massacre in August 2001 killed 15 Israelis, among them 7 children and a pregnant woman. * The
Yeshivat Beit Yisrael massacre A Palestinian suicide bombing occurred in the Beit Yisrael neighborhood in downtown Jerusalem on March 2, 2002. Eleven Israeli civilians were killed in the attack, including two infants, three children and two teenagers. Over 50 people were inju ...
on March 2, 2002, targeting a group of women and children next to a synagogue, resulted in the deaths of seven children and four adults. Eight of the dead came from the same family. * The 2004 Murder of Tali Hatuel and her four daughters, in which Palestinian militants killed Tali Hatuel, who was eight months pregnant along with her four daughters: Hila (11), Hadar (9), Roni (7) and Merav (2). After shooting at the vehicle in which Hatuel was driving with her daughters, witnesses said the militants approached the vehicle and shot the occupants repeatedly at close range. An alliance of Islamic Jihad and the
Popular Resistance Committees The Popular Resistance Committees (PRC) ( ar, لجان المقاومة الشعبية, ''Lijān al-Muqāwama al-Shaʿbiyya'') is a coalition of a number of armed Palestinian groups opposed to what they regard as the conciliatory approach of t ...
claimed responsibility for the attack. Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs reports that 8,341 Israelis were injured as a direct result of the conflict between 2001 and 2007 but does not specify how many were minors. Frequent rocket fire has also caused many injuries in the post-Intifada period. Permanent disability among children has resulted, including blindness,A New Shoah: The Untold Story of Israel's Victims of Terrorism. By Giulio Meotti, (publisher?). p.187 paralysis, brain damage, and loss of limbs. A 2003 study by
Schneider Children's Medical Center of Israel Schneider Children's Medical Center of Israel, founded in 1992, is a paediatric hospital focused on children's health, particularly organ transplantation and cancers. Schneider treats infants, children, teens, and young adults up to age 18 and for ...
concluded, "Analysis of the injuries sustained by the 160 children hospitalized after these events indicates that most were caused by blasts and penetration by foreign objects. Sixty-five percent of the children had multiple injuries, and the proportion of critical to fatal injuries was high (18%)." The rate of Israeli casualties in total declined following the construction of the West Bank Barrier; suicide bombing rates fell as potential bombers were thwarted before entering into Israeli territory.


Palestinian children

The first recorded incident of Israel Defense Forces killing Palestinian children was in November 1950 when three Palestinian children from the village of
Yalo Yalo ( ar, يالو, also transliterated Yalu) was a Palestinian Arab village located 13 kilometres southeast of Ramla. Identified by Edward Robinson as the ancient Canaanite and Israelite city of Aijalon.Robinson and Smith, 1841, vol 3, pp8081 Du ...
aged 8, 10 and 12, were shot near
Dayr Ayyub Dayr Ayyub ( ar, دير أيوب ) was a Palestinian Arab village in the Ramle Subdistrict. It was depopulated during the 1947–48 Civil War in Mandatory Palestine on March 6, 1948 by the Givati and Sheva' brigades of Operation Nachshon. It wa ...
in the
Latrun Latrun ( he, לטרון, ''Latrun''; ar, اللطرون, ''al-Latrun'') is a strategic hilltop in the Latrun salient in the Ayalon Valley, and a depopulated Palestinian village. It overlooks the road between Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, 25 kilometers ...
salient. According to adult witnesses, "only one man fired at them with a sten-gun but none of the detachment attempted to interfere." In February 1953, one of five Arab shepherds shot in al-Burj was 13 years old.Benny Morris, (1993) ''Israel's Border Wars, 1949–1956'' , Oxford University Press p 184 During the
1952 Beit Jala raid The 1952 raid on Beit Jala was a part of the reprisal operations that were carried out by Israel in response to Arab fedayeen attacks from across the Green Line. It involved an Israeli incursion into Beit Jala, a town in the Jordanian-annexed ...
, 4 children ranging in age from 6 to 14 were killed by machine gun fire. According to Amira Hass, 54 minors were brought to UNRWA clinics with head wounds from August 1989 to August 1993. The Association of Israeli and Palestinian Physicians for Human Rights (PHR-Israel) estimates that a child under the age of six was shot in the head every two weeks during the
First Intifada The First Intifada, or First Palestinian Intifada (also known simply as the intifada or intifadah),The word ''intifada'' () is an Arabic word meaning "uprising". Its strict Arabic transliteration is '. was a sustained series of Palestinian ...
. According to the
Defence for Children International Defence for Children International (DCI) is an independent non-governmental organisation set up in 1979, during the International Year of the Child, to ensure on-going, practical, systematic and concerted international and national action special ...
(DCI), of the "595 children killed 9 September 2000 to 30 June 2004during the
Second Intifada The Second Intifada ( ar, الانتفاضة الثانية, ; he, האינתיפאדה השנייה, ), also known as the Al-Aqsa Intifada ( ar, انتفاضة الأقصى, label=none, '), was a major Palestinian uprising against Israel. ...
, 383, or 64.4%, died as a result of Israeli air and ground attacks, during assassination attempts, or when Israeli soldiers opened fire randomly" and "212 children, or 35.6%, died as a result of injuries sustained during clashes with Israeli military forces".Status of Palestinian Children's Rights
Defence for Children International/Palestine Section
The DCI estimates that from January 1, 2001 until May 1, 2003, at least 4,816 Palestinian children were injured, with the majority of injuries resulting from Israeli army activity while the children were going about their normal activities. Amnesty International accused Israeli forces of inadequately investigating killings of children during the Second Intifada Intifada, while also condemning the killings of Israeli children by suicide bombings and other attacks by Palestinians. During Gaza War, a three-week armed conflict in the
Gaza Strip The Gaza Strip (;The New Oxford Dictionary of English (1998) – p.761 "Gaza Strip /'gɑːzə/ a strip of territory under the control of the Palestinian National Authority and Hamas, on the SE Mediterranean coast including the town of Gaza.. ...
between Israel and Palestinian militants during the winter of 2008–2009, an "unprecedented" number of children were killed or injured, according to the
Palestinian Centre for Human Rights The Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR, ar, المركز الفلسطيني لحقوق الإنسان) is a Palestinian people, Palestinian human rights organization based in Gaza City. It was founded in 1995 by Raji Sourani, who is its d ...
which listed 313 killed. The Israel Defense Forces said that 89 "non-combatants" under the age of 18 died. B'Tselem reported that 318 minors below the age of 18 were killed. B'Tselem's numbers were disputed. When the United Nations attempted an investigation of high civilian deaths as a possible war crime, Israelis refused to co-operate. During the November 2012 Israel-Gaza clashes, 30 children reportedly were killed. Other examples of casualties include: * Killing of 12-year-old
Muhammad al-Durrah On 30 September 2000, the second day of the Second Intifada, 12-year-old Muhammad al-Durrah () was killed in the Gaza Strip during widespread protests and riots across the Palestinian territories against Israeli military occupation. Jama ...
in September 2000 as his father tried to shield him from bullets became a defining image of the Second Intifada, and was compared to other iconic images of children under attack such as the boy in the Warsaw ghetto (1943). * In November 2000, 14-year-old
Faris Odeh Faris Odeh ( ar, فارس فائق عيسى حمدان عودة, 3 December 1985 – 8 November 2000) was a Palestinian boy shot dead by the Israel Defense Forces near the Karni crossing in the Gaza Strip while throwing stones in the second mon ...
was shot and killed while clashing with Israeli troops at the
Karni crossing The Karni Crossing ( ar, معبر كارني or معبر المنطار, he, מעבר קרני) was a cargo terminal on the Israel-Gaza Strip barrier located in the north-eastern end of the Gaza Strip and was opened in 1994 to allow Palestini ...
. * In 2001, an 11-year-old boy, Khalil al-Mughrabi, was killed by tank fire, and two others were injured. Al-Mughrabi had been playing football in a field a half-mile away. * During the 2007 assassination of Salah Shahade, a member of Hamas, several civilians were killed, including 8 children. * In December 2008 two Palestinian school girls were killed in Gaza when a Qassam rocket launched by militants fell short of its Israeli target and into a house.


Foreign children

* Aleksei Lupalu, 16, of
Ukraine Ukraine ( uk, Україна, Ukraïna, ) is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the second-largest European country after Russia, which it borders to the east and northeast. Ukraine covers approximately . Prior to the ongoing Russian inv ...
was killed in the
Dolphinarium discotheque suicide bombing On 1 June 2001, a Hamas-affiliated Islamist terrorist blew himself up outside the Dolphinarium discotheque on the beachfront in Tel Aviv, Israel, killing 21 Israelis, 16 of whom were teenagers. The majority of the victims were Israeli teenage ...
on June 2, 2001 along with 20 other civilians. Hamas claimed responsibility. * Shmuel Taubenfeld, 3 months, of New Square, New York was killed in the
Shmuel HaNavi bus bombing A suicide bombing of a crowded public bus (Egged bus 2) in the Shmuel HaNavi quarter in Jerusalem took place on August 19, 2003. Twenty-four people were killed and over 130 wounded. Many of the victims were children, some of them infants. The ...
on August 19, 2003 along with 22 other civilians, of whom 2 were foreign citizens. Over 130 were injured, and 7 fatalities were children. Both Hamas and Islamic Jihad claimed responsibility. * Daniel Wultz, aged 16, of
Weston, Florida Weston is a city in Broward County, Florida, United States, just west of Fort Lauderdale. It is part of the Miami metropolitan area, which is anchored by Miami. The population was 68,107 at the 2020 census. Weston is 30 miles northwest of Miami, F ...
, USA, was killed in the
2006 Tel Aviv shawarma restaurant bombing The 2006 Tel Aviv shawarma restaurant bombing was a suicide bombing on April 17, 2006 at "Rosh Ha'ir" shawarma restaurant in Tel Aviv, Israel. Eleven Israeli civilians were killed in the attack and 70 were injured. The Palestinian militant organ ...
. 10 other civilians were killed, of whom 7 were Israeli and 3 were from other countries, and over 70 were injured. Islamic Jihad claimed responsibility. * In March 2012, a French Muslim attacked the
Ozar Hatorah Ozar Hatorah ( he, אוצר התורה, lit=treasure of Torah) is an organization created in 1945 to provide Orthodox Jewish education. It began by setting up schools in Mandate Palestine, and after the foundation of the modern Israeli state, it wen ...
Jewish day school, later stating he did it to avenge Palestinians. He shot and killed a Rabbi who taught there and his two sons, Aryeh, aged 6, and Gabriel, aged 3, as well as 8-year-old Miriam Monsonego and severely injured 17-year-old Bryan Bijaoui.


Effects on children


Child indoctrination

A comprehensive three-year study (2009–2012) of Israeli and Palestinian textbooks, regarded by its researchers as "the most definitive and balanced study to date on the topic,"Harriet Sherwood
'Israeli and Palestinian textbooks omit borders,'
found that incitement, demonization or negative depictions of the other in children's education was "extremely rare" in both Israeli and Palestinian school texts, with only 6 instances discovered in over 9,964 pages of Palestinian textbooks, none of which consisted of "general dehumanising characterisations of personal traits of Jews or Israelis". Israeli officials rejected the study as biased, while Palestinian Authority officials claimed it vindicated their view that their textbooks are as fair and balanced as Israel's.Edmund Sanders
'Israeli and Palestinian textbooks fail balance test, study finds,'
''
Los Angeles Times The ''Los Angeles Times'' (abbreviated as ''LA Times'') is a daily newspaper that started publishing in Los Angeles in 1881. Based in the LA-adjacent suburb of El Segundo since 2018, it is the sixth-largest newspaper by circulation in the Un ...
'', February 4, 2013
The study, published in 2013 by the Council for Religious Institutions in the Holy Land, an interfaith association of Jewish, Christian, and Muslim leaders in Israel, the West Bank, and Gaza, produced different results. The study was supervised by a psychiatrist, Prof. emeritus
Bruce Wexler The English language name Bruce arrived in Scotland with the Normans, from the place name Brix, Manche in Normandy, France, meaning "the willowlands". Initially promulgated via the descendants of king Robert the Bruce (1274−1329), it has been a ...
of
Yale University Yale University is a private research university in New Haven, Connecticut. Established in 1701 as the Collegiate School, it is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and among the most prestigious in the wo ...
and his NGO, ''A Different Future'', and a joint Palestinian-Israeli research team, headed by Professors
Daniel Bar-Tal Daniel Bar-Tal ( he, דניאל בר-טל; born 1946) is an Israeli academic, author and Branco Weiss Professor of Research in Child Development and Education at School of Education, Tel Aviv University. Biography Bar-Tal was born in Stalinaba ...
(
Tel Aviv University Tel Aviv University (TAU) ( he, אוּנִיבֶרְסִיטַת תֵּל אָבִיב, ''Universitat Tel Aviv'') is a public research university in Tel Aviv, Israel. With over 30,000 students, it is the largest university in the country. Locate ...
) and Sami Adwan (
Bethlehem University Bethlehem University ( ar, جامعة بيت لحم) is a Catholic university in the city of Bethlehem in the West Bank, Palestine. It is the first university founded in the Occupied Palestinian Territories. History Established under Israeli ...
), was commissioned. Six Israeli and four Palestinian bilingual research assistants were employed to analyze the texts of 370 Israeli and 102 Palestinian books from grades 1 to 12. The study found that, while most schoolbooks on either side were factually accurate, both Israel and the Palestinians failed to adequately and positively represent each other, and presented "exclusive unilateral national narratives".AAP
Israeli, Palestinian textbooks 'one-sided'
AAP/''
The Australian ''The Australian'', with its Saturday edition, ''The Weekend Australian'', is a broadsheet newspaper published by News Corp Australia since 14 July 1964.Bruns, Axel. "3.1. The active audience: Transforming journalism from gatekeeping to gatew ...
'', February 5, 2013.
It was found that 40 percent of Israeli and 15 percent of Palestinian textbooks were judged to contain neutral depictions of the other, whereas negative characterizations were discerned in 26 percent of Israeli state school books and 50 percent of the Palestinian ones.Danielle Ziri
'Textbooks show both sides to blame for enmity,'
''
The Jerusalem Post ''The Jerusalem Post'' is a broadsheet newspaper based in Jerusalem, founded in 1932 during the British Mandate of Palestine by Gershon Agron as ''The Palestine Post''. In 1950, it changed its name to ''The Jerusalem Post''. In 2004, the paper w ...
'', February 4, 2013.
Israeli schoolbooks were deemed superior to Palestinian ones with regard to preparing children for peace, but the study praised both Israel and the Palestinian Authority for producing textbooks almost completely unblemished by "dehumanizing and demonizing characterizations of the other". In 2006 the
Anti-Defamation League The Anti-Defamation League (ADL), formerly known as the Anti-Defamation League of B'nai B'rith, is an international Jewish non-governmental organization based in the United States specializing in civil rights law. It was founded in late Septe ...
wrote that Hamas' four-year-old bi-weekly on-line magazine for children, al-Fatah (Arabic for "the conqueror"), featured stories and columns praising suicide bombers and attacks against the "Jewish enemy." In 2009 Hamas refused to allow Palestinian children to learn about the Holocaust, which it called "a lie invented by the Zionists" and referred to Holocaust education as a "war crime." More than 37,000 Palestinian boys, aged 15–17, took part in a Hamas youth training program during the 2012–13 academic year, which has become part of the official state educational curriculum since September 2012. Its purpose is to "initiate a new generation of Palestinian men in the struggle against Israel" and included fighting skills, firing a rifle and first aid. The program includes contributions by the
al-Qassam Brigades The Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades ( ar, كتائب الشهيد عز الدين القسام, , Battalions of martyr Izz ad-Din al-Qassam; also spelt Izzedine or Ezzedeen Al-Qassam Brigades; often shortened to Al-Qassam Brigades, IQB
. In early 2013 more than 3,000 Palestinian teenagers graduated from Hamas's first high school military training program in the Gaza Strip. Hamas officials said the program, which is an elective course, is aimed at creating a new generation of leaders to struggle against Israel. According to Abu Hozifa, a 29-year-old national security officer who teaches in the program, children are taught to "honor the national flag and anthem, to strengthen their affinity with the homeland and Jerusalem, the spirit of resistance and the principles of steadfastness. We also prepare them in terms of faith and physical fitness to serve as resistance fighters if they want to be in the future." Hamas also runs a two-week camp for 5,000 boys at a Hamas military base. The boys are dressed in military-style uniforms and trained by members of the Hamas National Guard and militants from Hamas' armed wing, the al-Qassam Brigades. They learn karate, street-fighting, and how to throw a
hand grenade A grenade is an explosive weapon typically thrown by hand (also called hand grenade), but can also refer to a shell (explosive projectile) shot from the muzzle of a rifle (as a rifle grenade) or a grenade launcher. A modern hand grenade genera ...
. In 2000, 25,000 Palestinian teenagers learned "kidnapping, ambushing and using assault weapons" at a summer camp run by
Yassir Arafat Mohammed Abdel Rahman Abdel Raouf al-Qudwa al-Husseini (4 / 24 August 1929 – 11 November 2004), popularly known as Yasser Arafat ( , ; ar, محمد ياسر عبد الرحمن عبد الرؤوف عرفات القدوة الحسيني, Mu ...
's staff who deal with
psychological warfare Psychological warfare (PSYWAR), or the basic aspects of modern psychological operations (PsyOp), have been known by many other names or terms, including Military Information Support Operations (MISO), Psy Ops, political warfare, "Hearts and Mi ...
. Lt. General
Shaul Mofaz Shaul Mofaz ( he, שאול מופז; 4 November 1948) is a retired Israeli military officer and politician. He joined the Israel Defense Forces in 1966 and served in the Paratroopers Brigade. He fought in the Six-Day War, Yom Kippur War, 1982 L ...
, the IDF's Chief of the General Staff, regarded the camps as "evidence of the risks of a new Palestinian upheaval". The Arafat aide who oversees the camps compared the camps to the Israeli Gadna corps for teenagers and said "We hope that we will achieve our rights through negotiations, so that summer camps like these will cease to exist. ... There is nothing we want more than a full and genuine peace, including Jerusalem, which would allow us to end the weapons-training and concentrate instead on teaching our young people about computers, and swimming and other recreations." In 2015, a children performed a song at a kindergarten graduation ceremony in the West Bank which included these lyrics: "If you stretch your hand, it will be chopped off. If you just look with your eye, it will be gouged out. ... We come for you before, and woe betide you if we come back again. You come to this land alive, but you will leave it as body part." Yasser Arafat's image accompanied the children on stage as they carried toy guns and wore uniforms. A woman's charity sponsored the ceremony. Israel education has presented military service as the primary goal of boys and girls from elementary school to high school. As an example of the Army's central role, Israeli children are encouraged to write letters to Israeli soldiers. In 2010 the IDF announced that as a result of recruitment problems it would introduce "Mobile Draft Offices" to visit 700 schools a year to making Israeli teenagers enthusiastic about military service; it also has started text messaging, online chats and other means to contact youth before they are conscripted.Janine Zacharia
Israel confronts flagging interest in military service
, ''
The Washington Post ''The Washington Post'' (also known as the ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'') is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. It is the most widely circulated newspaper within the Washington metropolitan area and has a large nati ...
'', November 7, 2010.
In 1999 a member of the Israeli anti-draft group
New Profile New Profile () is a movement for transforming Israeli society into a "civilian" one ("" – a term recently coined by parts of the Israeli left wing to highlight their view of the present society as "recruited" or "militarized"). It is a volunta ...
said about Israel's "military values" that "Children are indoctrinated throughout their whole lives and they're not given a chance to choose." The group promotes
Profile 21 Profile 21 ( he, פרופיל 21) is a medical profile code used by the military of Israel to classify Israelis who are deemed to have physical or psychological disabilities, making them permanently unfit for military service. Additionally, Profi ...
disability exemptions or explicit
conscientious objection A conscientious objector (often shortened to conchie) is an "individual who has claimed the right to refuse to perform military service" on the grounds of freedom of thought, conscience, or religion. The term has also been extended to objecti ...
as means to avoid service. Israel does prosecute and jail conscientious objectors. Dr.
Nurit Peled-Elhanan Nurit Peled-Elhanan ( he, נורית פלד-אלחנן; born 17 May 1949 in Jerusalem) is an Israeli philologist, professor of language and education at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, translator, and activist. She is a 2001 co-laureate of ...
, of the Tel Aviv University School of Education has said the Gadna military program for high school students "makes it clear, in no uncertain terms, at the supreme value is the state, and that the norms are established by the state and the army, whatever they may be ... there is no room for hesitation, for criticism or any signs of these. All, including the parents, must contribute to the effort of conscription."
Hebrew University The Hebrew University of Jerusalem (HUJI; he, הַאוּנִיבֶרְסִיטָה הַעִבְרִית בִּירוּשָׁלַיִם) is a public research university based in Jerusalem, Israel. Co-founded by Albert Einstein and Dr. Chaim Weiz ...
Professor Matanya Ben Artzi, whose son was arrested for resisting conscription, said "This is a takeover by the army of the high school, that is meant to be the foundation for a civil society." Education Minister
Yuli Tamir Yael "Yuli" Tamir ( he, יולי תמיר; born 26 February 1954) is an Israeli academic and former politician who served as a member of the Knesset for the Labor Party between 2003 and 2010, and as Minister of Immigrant Absorption and Educatio ...
said "We educate the pupils to civil and social commitment to the state, which includes military service. If the IDF is helping us encourage this outlook of commitment, then I will support the program." According to Michael Kaplan and Gideon Levy, during a weapons display held on Israel's 66th Independence Day in
Efrat Efrat ( he, אֶפְרָת), or previously officially Efrata ( he, אֶפְרָתָה), is an Israeli settlement in the West Bank, established in 1983 in the Judean Mountains. Efrat is located south of Jerusalem, between Bethlehem and Hebron, ...
, numerous photos showed Israeli children dressed in military attire and holding weapons. According to Kaplan, this indicates that not only Palestinian, but groups of Israeli children 'learn to glory violence and aspire towards violence'. Israeli Professor Edward Kaufman has written that Israel's faith in military superiority, its use of "extra-judicial executions" or "targeted elimination" of suspects that often result in deaths of innocents, has exacerbated the conflict. He writes it has resulted in the fact that "Israeli schoolchildren are among the most violent in the world, a phenomenon believed to be the result of force being an accepted societal means of dispute resolution. An astonishing 43 percent of Israeli children have admitted to bullying others, while one in four Israeli boys admitted to carrying a knife to school for protection. It is only to be expected that Israel's use of overwhelming force to deal with the Palestinians has had a trickle-down effect on society. The culture of violence prevalent in Israel has had a dramatic impact on the most impressionable members of the community: children."Edward Kaufman, "Merging the Human Rights Dimension into Peace Making – Is it good for the Jews", Chapter 9 of Elizabeth Matthews, ''The Israel–Palestine Conflict: Parallel Discourses'', Taylor & Francis, 2011
p. 179
, access date April 22, 2013,
In 2012, a joint study of Palestinian, Jewish-Israeli and Arab-Israeli children found that exposure to political conflict and violence contributed to an increase in aggressive behavior. According to the study, "Palestinian children were at the greatest risk for exposure to violence across settings as well as at the highest level of aggressive behavior in comparison to the two other groups. Males were uniformly at greater risk than were females for all forms of exposure to violence as well as more aggressive."


Gadna program

Gadna is an Israeli pre-army military program to prepare high school students for their mandatory service. Gadna was created before the
Israeli declaration of independence The Israeli Declaration of Independence, formally the Declaration of the Establishment of the State of Israel ( he, הכרזה על הקמת מדינת ישראל), was proclaimed on 14 May 1948 ( 5 Iyar 5708) by David Ben-Gurion, the Executive ...
. During the
1948 Arab–Israeli War The 1948 (or First) Arab–Israeli War was the second and final stage of the 1948 Palestine war. It formally began following the end of the British Mandate for Palestine at midnight on 14 May 1948; the Israeli Declaration of Independence had ...
, trainees served as combatants. Until 1990, Gadna focused on instilling patriotic values in Israeli youth and encouraging immigration of youth to Israel. Nowadays, the program concentrates on increasing motivation to serve in the Army. As of 2007, an estimated minority of 16,000 to 19,000 11th grade pupils annually engage in squad-sized operations, night treks and shooting, with the promise of rewards for excellence when the youth join the Israel Defense Forces. Educators have criticized the program as "overly militaristic". The one-week-long program was revised in 2007 to include lessons in combat doctrine, the purity of arms and ethics in combat.


Schooling disruptions

Schooling has been disrupted for both Israeli and Palestinian children. Israeli children at or on the way to school have been killed by Palestinian militants, as in the 1970
Avivim school bus massacre The Avivim school bus bombing was a terrorist attack on an Israeli school bus on 22 May 1970, in which 12 civilians were killed, nine of them children, and 25 were wounded, one of whom died of a wound sustained in the attack 44 years later. The ...
that killed 9 children and injured 25, the 1974
Ma'alot massacre The Ma'alot massacreSources describing the event as a "massacre": * "The day after the Ma'alot massacre, condemned by Pope Paul VI and most Western leaders as 'an evil outrage…'" Frank Gervasi. ''Thunder Over the Mediterranean'', McKay, 1975 ...
which resulted in the death of 22 elementary school children, the 1992
murder of Helena Rapp The Murder of Helena Rapp occurred on 24 May 1992 when a Palestinian stabbed her to death in the Israeli coastal city of Bat Yam. Rapp was fifteen when she was killed. The attack shocked the Israeli public as one of the more prominent of a seri ...
, the 1997
Island of Peace massacre The Island of Peace massacre was a mass murder attack that occurred at the Island of Peace site in Naharayim on March 13, 1997, in which a Jordanian soldier opened fire at a large group of Israeli schoolgirls from the AMIT Fuerst (Fürst) S ...
where 7 school girls on a class field trip were shot and killed, the 2002 killing of 3 teenagers at the Hitzim yeshiva high school in Itamar, and the 2008
Mercaz HaRav massacre The 2008 Jerusalem yeshiva attack was a mass shooting attack that occurred on 6 March 2008, in which a lone Palestinian gunman shot multiple students at the Mercaz HaRav yeshiva, a religious school in Jerusalem, after which the gunman himself w ...
resulting in 8 children killed and 11 injured. Schools throughout southern Israel are closed when rocket fire from Gaza becomes intense, including those in major cities such as Beersheba and Ashdod. Israeli authorities have reported incidents in which schools were damaged and school buses destroyed by
Qassam rockets The Qassam rocket ( ar, صاروخ القسام ''Ṣārūkh al-Qassām''; also ''Kassam'') is a simple, steel artillery rocket developed and deployed by the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades, the military arm of Hamas. These rockets cannot be fired ...
and mortars. Israel has closed schools in the West Bank for months during periods of conflict. In 1989 200,000 students were kept out of class from January to July. During Israeli curfews imposed during 2002 teachers and students created makeshift schools in halls, living rooms and alleys so students would not have to travel by car or bus to get to schools. Israel's
separation barrier A separation barrier or separation wall is a barrier, wall or fence, constructed to limit the movement of people across a certain line or border, or to separate peoples or cultures. A separation barrier that runs along an internationally recogni ...
has separated some students from their schools, leading to long waits at checkpoints. In 2008 Israel closed two charity schools for needy children because Israel suspected they were tied to Hamas. Schools in Gaza also close during clashes, as during the November 2012 Operation Pillar of Defense. Israeli weapon strikes in Gaza have destroyed or damaged Palestinian schools. Ninety-three schools were shelled in 2000–2001. During the three-week Gaza War Israeli airstrikes destroyed 18 schools and damaged 280, including
United Nations Relief and Works Agency The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) is a UN agency that supports the relief and human development of Palestinian refugees. UNRWA's mandate encompasses Palestinians displaced by the 1948 ...
schools. Israel's
blockade of the Gaza Strip The blockade of the Gaza Strip is the ongoing land, air, and sea blockade of the Gaza Strip imposed by Israel and Egypt temporarily in 2005–2006 and permanently from 2007 onwards, following the Israeli disengagement from Gaza. The block ...
prohibited import of school supplies and school construction materials into Gaza. In 2011, after months of negotiations, Israel allowed in enough material to build 18 new schools. Settlers also have disrupted schooling of children. In 2002 there was one attempted and two actual bombings of Palestinian schools by Jewish vigilante groups. In 2011 United Nations Special Rapporteur
Richard A. Falk Richard Anderson Falk (born November 13, 1930) is an American professor emeritus of international law at Princeton University, and Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor's Chairman of the Board of Trustees. In 2004, he was listed as the author ...
said that many Palestinian children have stopped attending school because of frequent settler harassment.UN expert urges more protection against violence for Palestinian children
, United Nations News Center, October 20, 2011.


Medical care


Israeli

Israel has maintained a system of socialized health care for all Israelis since its establishment in 1948. A National Health Insurance law was passed in 1995. Coverage includes medical diagnosis and treatment, preventive medicine, hospitalization, surgery and transplants, preventive dental care for children, and other benefits. The Israeli-Palestinian conflict, however, has been found to have negative impacts on children's health and medical care. A 2007 study found that stress from the violence in years prior has led to sharply increased levels of alcohol consumption, smoking, and substance abuse among Israeli adolescents. It stated, in part, that "Close physical exposure to acts of terrorism was positively associated with higher levels of alcohol consumption, binge drinking, and cannabis that were significant before and after we controlled for PTSS and depression." The study concluded that there is a high risk of future health complications as a result of these behaviors. The Unit of Emergency Medicine from Schneider Children's Medical Center of Israel performed a two-year research and review surrounding the medical care of child terror victims. The results, which were published in 2003, stated, "During the study period, 41 mass-casualty events (MCEs) were managed by Magen David Adom. Each event involved on average, 32 regular and nine mobile intensive care unit ambulances with 93 medics, 19 paramedics, and four physicians. Evacuation time was 5–10 minutes in urban areas and 15–20 minutes in rural areas. In most cases, victims were evacuated to multiple facilities. To improve efficiency and speed, the Magen David Adom introduced the use of well-trained 'first-responders' and volunteer, off-duty professionals, in addition to 'scoop and run' on-the-scene management." It added that, "Compared to children with non-terrorism-related injuries, the terrorism-related group had a higher rate of surgical interventions, longer hospital stays, and greater needs for rehabilitation services." Hospitals in southern Israel have been damaged by Qassam rockets from Gaza, and ambulances have been delayed by Palestinians pelting them with rocks. In 2012, a Palestinian man admitted to poisoning a Jewish family, causing two adults and two children to be hospitalized.


Palestinian

Since the 1990s, and especially since the violence associated with the
Second Intifada The Second Intifada ( ar, الانتفاضة الثانية, ; he, האינתיפאדה השנייה, ), also known as the Al-Aqsa Intifada ( ar, انتفاضة الأقصى, label=none, '), was a major Palestinian uprising against Israel. ...
, Israel has created hundreds of permanent roadblocks and checkpoints staffed by
Israeli military The Israel Defense Forces (IDF; he, צְבָא הַהֲגָנָה לְיִשְׂרָאֵל , ), alternatively referred to by the Hebrew-language acronym (), is the national military of the State of Israel. It consists of three service branc ...
or
border police A border guard of a country is a national security agency that performs border security. Some of the national border guard agencies also perform coast guard (as in Germany, Italy or Ukraine) and rescue service duties. Name and uniform In diff ...
. While some are between Israel and the
West Bank The West Bank ( ar, الضفة الغربية, translit=aḍ-Ḍiffah al-Ġarbiyyah; he, הגדה המערבית, translit=HaGadah HaMaʽaravit, also referred to by some Israelis as ) is a landlocked territory near the coast of the Mediter ...
to prevent possible terrorist attacks, as of September 2011 most were within the West Bank, with 522 such permanent and an average of 495 temporary "flying checkpoints". A 2009 United Nations reported stated that the checkpoints were evolving into "a more permanent system of control" reducing the space available for Palestinian growth and movement for the benefit of the increasing
Israeli settler Israeli settlements, or Israeli colonies, are civilian communities inhabited by Israeli citizens, overwhelmingly of Jewish ethnicity, built on lands occupied by Israel in the 1967 Six-Day War. The international community considers Israeli se ...
population. A 2002 incident of a bomb found in a
Red Crescent The International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement is a humanitarian movement with approximately 97 million volunteers, members and staff worldwide. It was founded to protect human life and health, to ensure respect for all human beings, an ...
ambulance increased vigilance regarding those vehicles. In 2004 psychiatrist Derek Summerfield wrote in an opinion piece in the ''
British Medical Journal ''The BMJ'' is a weekly peer-reviewed medical trade journal, published by the trade union the British Medical Association (BMA). ''The BMJ'' has editorial freedom from the BMA. It is one of the world's oldest general medical journals. Origi ...
'' that the then-recent Israeli military reoccupation of the West Bank and Gaza divided communities by "
checkpoints Checkpoint may refer to: Places * Border checkpoint, a place on the land border between two states where travellers and/or goods are inspected * Security checkpoint, erected and enforced within contiguous areas under military or paramilitary cont ...
", put up massive walls like the
Israeli West Bank barrier The Israeli West Bank barrier, comprising the West Bank Wall and the West Bank fence, is a separation barrier built by Israel along the Green Line and inside parts of the West Bank. It is a contentious element of the Israeli–Palestinian c ...
and the Gaza Strip barrier and demolished 60,000 homes. The
World Bank The World Bank is an international financial institution that provides loans and grants to the governments of low- and middle-income countries for the purpose of pursuing capital projects. The World Bank is the collective name for the Interna ...
estimated that due to these actions Palestinian poverty had tripled in three years with 60% of the population subsisting at poverty level and over half of households eating just one meal daily. The barrier was isolating 97 primary health clinics and 11 hospitals from Palestinian patients. During that time there were 87 cases in which denial of access to medical treatment caused death, including to 30 children, some babies born while women in labor were kept at checkpoints. Summerfield said that
Physicians for Human Rights-Israel A physician (American English), medical practitioner (Commonwealth English), medical doctor, or simply doctor, is a health professional who practices medicine, which is concerned with promoting, maintaining or restoring health through th ...
has criticized the
Israel Medical Association Israel Medical Association (IMA), is a professional association of physicians in Israel. History The association traces its origins to the ''Hebrew Medicinal Society for Jaffa and the Jaffa District'', founded in 1912, which later became the ''Heb ...
for its silence on these issues. A 2009
The Lancet ''The Lancet'' is a weekly peer-reviewed general medical journal and one of the oldest of its kind. It is also the world's highest-impact academic journal. It was founded in England in 1823. The journal publishes original research articles, ...
medical journal report, authored by Dr. Awad Mataria and Dr. Hanan Abdul Rahim, described the healthcare system in the Palestinian territories as "fragmented and incoherent". Dr. Rahim said there were gaps in care, a low level of post-natal care, and little decline infant mortality rates compared with other Arab countries that had been able to bring them down. The report cited a United Nations' report that stated more than 60 Palestinian women had given birth at Israeli checkpoints and 36 of their babies died as a result. The physicians blamed conditions of military occupation, Palestinian political instability, inconsistent and fragmented foreign aid donor policies and a focus on emergency aid, as opposed to long-term development inside the Palestinian territories.Palestinian health care 'ailing'
,
BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board ex ...
, Thursday, March 5, 2009; this was one article in ''The Lancet'' serie
Health in the Occupied Palestinian Territory 2009
, launched March 4, 2009.
The
World Health Organization The World Health Organization (WHO) is a specialized agency of the United Nations responsible for international public health. The WHO Constitution states its main objective as "the attainment by all peoples of the highest possible level of h ...
reports regularly on health care in the "occupied Palestinian territory." In response to the Summerfield opinion piece, Irwin Mansdorf, a member of ''Task Force on Medical and Public Health Issues, Scholars for Peace in the Middle East'' wrote an opinion piece about routine care that Palestinians continue to receive in Israeli hospitals and from Israeli physicians, saying that "Palestinians receive care in Israel that they could not receive in any neighboring Arab country. In the last few months alone nearly 200 Palestinian children who were referred under a joint Israeli–Palestinian programme to treat children with serious medical conditions have already undergone major surgery at Israeli hospitals at no cost to the families. Another 350–400 Palestinian children have undergone free diagnostic testing." Simon M Fellerman also wrote one noting that ''Saving Children'', established by the
Peres Center for Peace The Peres Center for Peace, located in Jaffa, Israel, is an independent non-profit, non-governmental, and non-political organization founded in 1996 by Nobel Peace Laureate and former President of Israel Shimon Peres. Its aim is to further Pere ...
, enables hundreds of Palestinian children to receive free medical care, in particular cardiac surgery, from Israeli surgeons. In response to the Lancet report, an Israeli government spokesperson said that Palestinians in the territories could receive medical care in Israel itself, noting that 28,000 Palestinians from Gaza had been treated in Israel during the two years covered by the Lancet report. In 2011, the Israeli Civil Administration's Health Coordinator, Dalia Bassa and the Commander of the IDF's Alpine unit jointly organized a ski trip to Mt. Hermon in northern Israel for Palestinian children diagnosed with cancer. The children, who were accompanied by parents, family members, and Israeli soldiers from the Alpine Unit, are undergoing treatment at the Augusta Victoria hospital in Jerusalem. Accidents from children playing with Unexploded ordnance is a low-level but recurrent threat to children's health. The majority of incidents involving unexploded ordnance occurred in the Gaza Strip. "Save A Child's Heart" is a program in which any child with heart problems can receive free medical attention and surgery from select doctors and hospitals within Israel. As of 2009 it had operated on 1000 Palestinian children.
Hadassah Medical Center Hadassah Medical Center ( he, הָמֶרְכָּז הָרְפוּאִי הֲדַסָּה) is an Israeli medical organization established in 1934 that operates two university hospitals in Jerusalem – one in Ein Karem and one in Mount Scopus –, ...
has reported that
organ donation Organ donation is the process when a person allows an organ of their own to be removed and transplanted to another person, legally, either by consent while the donor is alive or dead with the assent of the next of kin. Donation may be for re ...
s in which the recipient is a Palestinian and the donor an Israeli, or vice versa, are not unusual. In one case a Palestinian from
Bethlehem Bethlehem (; ar, بيت لحم ; he, בֵּית לֶחֶם '' '') is a city in the central West Bank, Palestine, about south of Jerusalem. Its population is approximately 25,000,Amara, 1999p. 18.Brynen, 2000p. 202. and it is the capital o ...
received the kidney of an Israeli. The families of
Yoni Jesner ''Yoni'' (; sometimes also ), sometimes called ''pindika'', is an abstract or aniconic representation of the Hindu goddess Shakti. It is usually shown with ''linga'' – its masculine counterpart. Together, they symbolize the merging of micro ...
, a Jewish teenager, and Ahmed Khatib, a Palestinian boy, donated their organs to children from the opposite sides of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict. Yoni Jesner died in a suicide bombing in 2002, while Ahmed Khatib was killed by IDF gunfire in 2005. In 2002, 16-year-old Israeli Rachel Thaler was killed along with two other teenagers in a
suicide bombing A suicide attack is any violent attack, usually entailing the attacker detonating an explosive, where the attacker has accepted their own death as a direct result of the attacking method used. Suicide attacks have occurred throughout histor ...
. After her death, Thaler's family chose to have her organs donated.


Malnutrition

In a 2003 United Nations report, Special Rapporteur
Jean Ziegler Jean Ziegler (; born Hans Ziegler, 19 April 1934) is a Swiss former professor of sociology at the University of Geneva and the Sorbonne, Paris, and former vice-president of the Advisory Committee to the United Nations Human Rights Council. He ...
reported that over 22 per cent of children under 5 in the Palestinian territories were suffering from malnutrition and 15.6 per cent from acute
anaemia Anemia or anaemia (British English) is a blood disorder in which the blood has a reduced ability to carry oxygen due to a lower than normal number of red blood cells, or a reduction in the amount of hemoglobin. When anemia comes on slowly, th ...
." According to the
World Bank The World Bank is an international financial institution that provides loans and grants to the governments of low- and middle-income countries for the purpose of pursuing capital projects. The World Bank is the collective name for the Interna ...
, food consumption in the Palestinian Territories fell by more than 25 per cent per capita, and food shortages particularly of proteins, were reported. A 2007
Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics The Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics (PCBS; ar, الجهاز المركزي للإحصاء الفلسطيني) is the official statistical institution of the State of Palestine. Its main task is to provide credible statistical figures a ...
poll of Palestinian children in the West Bank and Gaza found that as a result of poverty about 10 percent of Palestinian children suffer "permanent effects from malnutrition", including especially stunted growth. In 2010 the Danish government sponsored a survey that found that 10 percent of children in Gaza are malnourished. In April 2011, the Israel Defense Forces spokesperson's office made available to the media comments by the deputy director of the
International Committee of the Red Cross The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC; french: Comité international de la Croix-Rouge) is a humanitarian organization which is based in Geneva, Switzerland, and it is also a three-time Nobel Prize Laureate. State parties (signato ...
in the Gaza Strip, who the IDF reported had said that there is "no humanitarian crisis in Gaza. If you go to the supermarket, there are products. There are restaurants and a nice beach." She further said that problems caused by the blockade were "mainly in maintenance of infrastructure and in access to goods, concrete for example." ''
The Christian Science Monitor ''The Christian Science Monitor'' (''CSM''), commonly known as ''The Monitor'', is a nonprofit news organization that publishes daily articles in electronic format as well as a weekly print edition. It was founded in 1908 as a daily newspaper ...
'' staff writer Dan Murphy interviewed the spokeswoman for the Red Cross, Cecilia Goin, who said the comments were not provided in full context and thus gave the inaccurate impression "that everything was OK" when in fact the situation was still "dire." Murphy, who has been to Gaza, wrote that products in supermarkets and restaurants were "out of reach" for most Gazans. He wrote: "In this context the "no humanitarian crisis" means that people in Gaza aren't starving, which is certainly true. The United Nation's Relief and Works Agency provides aid to most of Gaza's 1.5 million people, and has been allowed to bring in food and medical supplies. The Red Cross and other aid groups are active as well." He also noted that a 2008 United States diplomatic cable released by
WikiLeaks WikiLeaks () is an international Nonprofit organization, non-profit organisation that published news leaks and classified media provided by anonymous Source (journalism), sources. Julian Assange, an Australian Internet activism, Internet acti ...
stated that "Israeli officials have confirmed to Embassy officials on multiple occasions that they intend to keep the Gazan economy functioning at the lowest level possible consistent with avoiding a humanitarian crisis". A 2012 report jointly issued by aid organizations
Save the Children The Save the Children Fund, commonly known as Save the Children, is an international non-governmental organization established in the United Kingdom in 1919 to improve the lives of children through better education, health care, and economic ...
and Britain's
Medical Aid for Palestinians Medical Aid for Palestinians (MAP) is a British charity that offers medical services in the West Bank, Gaza and Lebanon, and advocates for Palestinians' rights to health and dignity. It is in special consultative status with ECOSOC since 2002. Ai ...
found that 10 percent of Gaza children under five had stunted growth due to malnutrition and that 68 percent of pre-school children and 58 percent of children of school age suffered from anaemia. The report stated that the five-year blockade of Gaza Strip, which has prevented importation of necessary supplies and materials, as well as Israel's Gaza War bombing of infrastructure, has led to water being severely contaminated by fertilizer and human waste. Diseases like
typhoid Typhoid fever, also known as typhoid, is a disease caused by '' Salmonella'' serotype Typhi bacteria. Symptoms vary from mild to severe, and usually begin six to 30 days after exposure. Often there is a gradual onset of a high fever over several ...
and
diarrhea Diarrhea, also spelled diarrhoea, is the condition of having at least three loose, liquid, or watery bowel movements each day. It often lasts for a few days and can result in dehydration due to fluid loss. Signs of dehydration often begin wi ...
, spread by contaminated water, have doubled in children under the age of 3, which has long-term health implications.Gaza's Children: Falling behind
, Report of
Save the Children The Save the Children Fund, commonly known as Save the Children, is an international non-governmental organization established in the United Kingdom in 1919 to improve the lives of children through better education, health care, and economic ...
and Britain's
Medical Aid for Palestinians Medical Aid for Palestinians (MAP) is a British charity that offers medical services in the West Bank, Gaza and Lebanon, and advocates for Palestinians' rights to health and dignity. It is in special consultative status with ECOSOC since 2002. Ai ...
, June 2012.
Open sewage is a problem and in 2012 three children drowned in pools of it.A Mea Culpa From The Media
''
The Jewish Week ''The Jewish Week'' is a weekly independent community newspaper targeted towards the Jewish community of the metropolitan New York City area. ''The Jewish Week'' covers news relating to the Jewish community in NYC. In March 2016, ''The Jewish We ...
'', November 18, 2012.
In October 2012 an Israeli human rights group forced Israel to disclose a 2008 document that calculated that Gaza's 1.5 million inhabitants needed 2,279 calories per person a day to avoid malnutrition and widespread starvation. The Israeli military disputes critics' claims it used the guidelines during its blockade of Gaza to restrict food shipments to Gaza in order to put pressure on Hamas.Military counted Gaza residents' calories during Israeli blockade
Associated Press The Associated Press (AP) is an American non-profit news agency headquartered in New York City. Founded in 1846, it operates as a cooperative, unincorporated association. It produces news reports that are distributed to its members, U.S. newspa ...
, October 17, 2012.


Post-traumatic stress

Researchers are finding high levels of post-traumatic stress disorder among Palestinian children. According to some researchers, the average rate of post-traumatic stress disorder among children from both sides of the Green Line is about 70 per cent.Defense Update
"Terror related Post-Traumatic Stress: The Israeli Experience", by David Eshel Dr. Avital Laufer of Tel Aviv University told the Knesset Committee on the Rights of Children. The committee was discussing the effects of the terror attacks of the past 32 months on children. Laufer's findings were based on a study of some 3,000 children aged 13 to 15, from both sides of the "Green Line". Some 70 percent of the children said that the terror attacks had had a direct impact on their lives, causing them to abandon or avoid certain activities.
Gaza Community Health Programs carried out a study and found that Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) rate for children in Gaza was that 54% suffered from severe PTSD, 33.5% from moderate and 11% from mild and doubtful levels of PTSD. In a report, published in the Canadian Journal of Psychiatry, it was estimated that the rate of psychological morbidity in the southern region of
Bethlehem Bethlehem (; ar, بيت لحم ; he, בֵּית לֶחֶם '' '') is a city in the central West Bank, Palestine, about south of Jerusalem. Its population is approximately 25,000,Amara, 1999p. 18.Brynen, 2000p. 202. and it is the capital o ...
in the West Bank, to be 42.3% among Palestinian children. The rate was 46.3% for boys and 37.8% for girls. These rates, the study reported, were twice the rate of psychological morbidity in the Gaza strip.''Canadian Journal of Psychiatry''
, Vol 49, No 1, January 2004
According to some reports, more than 370,000 Palestinian children have been left shell-shocked by 2014 Israeli war on Gaza. Israeli professor Edward Kaufman has written that widespread PTSD among Israeli children is caused by "the environment of fear resulting from indiscriminate acts of terror." According to an Israeli child psychiatrist, about half of the children in Jerusalem, the city hit hardest by Palestinian violence, experience symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder, two to three times higher than the rate of children suffering from other causes of trauma. A recent study by Herzog's trauma centre found that 33 per cent of Israeli youth have been affected personally by terrorism, either by being at the scene of an attack or by knowing someone injured or killed by terrorists. Seventy per cent of those surveyed reported increased subjective fear or hopelessness. Studies have found high levels of PTSD in southern Israel which is frequently attacked by rockets and mortars from the Gaza Strip. In particular, frequent air-raid sirens and explosions of incoming projectiles have caused severe psychological trauma in the city of
Sderot Sderot ( he, שְׂדֵרוֹת, , lit. ''Boulevards'', ar, سديروت) is a western Negev city and former development town in the Southern District of Israel. In it had a population of . Sderot is located less than a mile from Gaza (the c ...
.


Media manipulation

Some images of children in the conflict have been shown to be false, digitally altered, or outdated, and are used to manipulate public sentiment. During the
March 2012 Gaza–Israel clashes Operation Returning Echo (מבצע הד חוזר) was an Israel Defense Forces (IDF) military operation in the Gaza Strip from March 9 until March 14, 2012. It was the worst outbreak of violence covered by the media in the region since the 20 ...
, Khulood Badawi, an Information and Media Coordinator for the United Nations
Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) is a United Nations (UN) body established in December 1991 by the General Assembly to strengthen the international response to complex emergencies and natural disaster ...
, tweeted a picture of a Palestinian child covered in blood. She was criticized because the child was 5-year-old Raja Abu Shaban, who was killed in 2006 when she fell from a swing, and not in an Israeli attack. Badawi later tweeted that she mistakenly had tweeted an old photo.
Ma'an News Agency Ma'an News Agency (MNA; ar, وكالة معا الإخبارية) is a large wire service created in 2005 in the Palestinian territories. It is part of the Ma'an Network, a non-governmental organization media network created in 2002 in the Palest ...
reported the hospital medical report on the dead girl stated she died "due to falling from a high area during the Israeli strike on Gaza". Interviews with relatives, news reports and investigations by human rights organizations also suggest that her death indirectly was caused by an Israeli air strike as little as 100 meters away, though accounts differ on how this occurred. Israeli officials have said that the girl's death had nothing to do with Israel. One day later,
Ofir Gendelman Ofir Gendelman ( he, אופיר גנדלמן; ar, أوفير جندلمان) (born July 19, 1971) is an Israeli diplomat and current spokesperson to the Arab media in the Israel Prime Minister's Office, a position he has held since April 2010, pr ...
, a spokesman for Israeli Prime Minister
Benjamin Netanyahu Benjamin "Bibi" Netanyahu (; ; born 21 October 1949) is an Israeli politician who served as the ninth prime minister of Israel from 1996 to 1999 and again from 2009 to 2021. He is currently serving as Leader of the Opposition and Chairman of ...
, tweeted a photo of an Israeli woman and her two children ducking a Gaza rocket describing it as "when a rocket fired by terrorists from Gaza is about to hit their home." When it was proved the photo was from 2009 he said, "I never stated that the photo was current. It illustrates the fear that people in southern Israel live in."Diaa Hadid
Old photos tweeted in Israel-Palestinian conflict
Associated Press The Associated Press (AP) is an American non-profit news agency headquartered in New York City. Founded in 1846, it operates as a cooperative, unincorporated association. It produces news reports that are distributed to its members, U.S. newspa ...
Worldstream, via
Highbeam HighBeam Research was a paid search engine and full text online archive owned by Gale, a subsidiary of Cengage, for thousands of newspapers, magazines, academic journals, newswires, trade magazines, and encyclopedias in English. It was headquart ...
, March 15, 2012.
In early November 2012, Israeli activists reported that several journalists with cameras followed a Palestinian girl as she repeatedly tried without success to provoke a violent reaction from Israeli soldiers. On November 18, Alarab Net, an Arab news site, released a photo of three bloodied children and their mother with the caption "martyred massacred family in Gaza". This image turned out to be of Syrian children. Pro-Palestinian activists published a photograph on Twitter of an injured infant held by a rescue worker, writing "even this young injured Palestinian child doesn't seem surprised or scared, used to Israeli terrorism." The baby in the picture was quickly identified as an Israeli injured in a Hamas rocket attack, which also killed her mother. ''
The Washington Post ''The Washington Post'' (also known as the ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'') is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. It is the most widely circulated newspaper within the Washington metropolitan area and has a large nati ...
'' reported at the time on the tendency of both sides in the conflict to politicize photos of injured and dead children.


Peace projects

Many
Arab–Israeli peace projects Arab–Israeli peace projects are projects to promote peace and understanding between the Arab League and Israel in different spheres. These are part of a broader attempt at a Israeli–Palestinian peace process, peace process between Palestinians ...
actively involve children and teenagers. For example,
Seeds of Peace Seeds of Peace is a peacebuilding and leadership development organization headquartered in New York City. It was founded in 1993. As its main program, the organization brings youth and educators from areas of conflict to its camp in Maine. It a ...
was founded in 1993 with the goal of creating new generations of leaders in conflict regions that will no longer accept outdated and harmful stereotypes about each other. This would occur by bringing together youth from both sides of conflict regions to literally put a human face on those who were previously perceived as an enemy. The organization, which began with Israeli, Palestinian, and Egyptian teenagers, has expanded to reach
Jordan Jordan ( ar, الأردن; tr. ' ), officially the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan,; tr. ' is a country in Western Asia. It is situated at the crossroads of Asia, Africa, and Europe, within the Levant region, on the East Bank of the Jordan Rive ...
,
Morocco Morocco (),, ) officially the Kingdom of Morocco, is the westernmost country in the Maghreb region of North Africa. It overlooks the Mediterranean Sea to the north and the Atlantic Ocean to the west, and has land borders with Algeria to ...
,
Qatar Qatar (, ; ar, قطر, Qaṭar ; local vernacular pronunciation: ), officially the State of Qatar,) is a country in Western Asia. It occupies the Qatar Peninsula on the northeastern coast of the Arabian Peninsula in the Middle East; it sh ...
,
Tunisia ) , image_map = Tunisia location (orthographic projection).svg , map_caption = Location of Tunisia in northern Africa , image_map2 = , capital = Tunis , largest_city = capital , ...
,
Afghanistan Afghanistan, officially the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan,; prs, امارت اسلامی افغانستان is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central Asia and South Asia. Referred to as the Heart of Asia, it is bordere ...
,
Yemen Yemen (; ar, ٱلْيَمَن, al-Yaman), officially the Republic of Yemen,, ) is a country in Western Asia. It is situated on the southern end of the Arabian Peninsula, and borders Saudi Arabia to the Saudi Arabia–Yemen border, north and ...
,
India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...
,
Pakistan Pakistan ( ur, ), officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan ( ur, , label=none), is a country in South Asia. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by population, fifth-most populous country, with a population of almost 24 ...
,
Maine Maine () is a state in the New England and Northeastern regions of the United States. It borders New Hampshire to the west, the Gulf of Maine to the southeast, and the Canadian provinces of New Brunswick and Quebec to the northeast and north ...
,
Cyprus Cyprus ; tr, Kıbrıs (), officially the Republic of Cyprus,, , lit: Republic of Cyprus is an island country located south of the Anatolian Peninsula in the eastern Mediterranean Sea. Its continental position is disputed; while it is geo ...
(
Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus Northern Cyprus ( tr, Kuzey Kıbrıs), officially the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC; tr, Kuzey Kıbrıs Türk Cumhuriyeti, ''KKTC''), is a ''de facto'' state that comprises the northeastern portion of the island of Cyprus. Recog ...
/
Republic of Cyprus Cyprus ; tr, Kıbrıs (), officially the Republic of Cyprus,, , lit: Republic of Cyprus is an island country located south of the Anatolian Peninsula in the eastern Mediterranean Sea. Its continental position is disputed; while it is geo ...
), and the
Balkans The Balkans ( ), also known as the Balkan Peninsula, is a geographical area in southeastern Europe with various geographical and historical definitions. The region takes its name from the Balkan Mountains that stretch throughout the who ...
.
Children of Peace Children of Peace is a United Kingdom, British-based, non-partisan Charitable organization, charity that focuses upon building friendship, trust and reconciliation between Israeli and Palestinian people, Palestinian children, aged 4–17, reg ...
, a charity based in the United Kingdom, is self-described as focused "upon building alliances with like-minded organisations in the Gaza, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon and the West Bank stablishingprojects and programmes in the arts, education, health and sports for Israeli and Palestinian children, aged 4 – 17." Richard Martin, who founded the organization in 2005, has stated that he refuses to take sides because "all children suffer in conflict." Middle East Education Through Technology (MEET), the Institute for Circlework, TEC-the Center for Teachnologystrives, and Hand in Hand focus on educational efforts. Hand in Hand is a network of bilingual (Hebrew-Arabic) schools in which Jewish and Arab children study together. It was founded in 1997 by two Israelis, one Arab and one Jewish, with the philosophy of breaking negative stereotypes, cultivating mutual respect and understanding, and providing a dynamic example that Jews and Arabs can study, work and live together in peace. Hand in Hand has also hosted basketball games organized by PeacePlayers International (PPI) between Israeli and Palestinian teenagers, describing them as "baby steps" towards peace. Ala Khatib, a co-principal, said that "Never mind what is going on outside, whether it's bombing in Gaza or if it's suicide bombing in Tel Aviv, you can't stop school. You have to go to school, you have to face the other side, you have to say good morning, and you have to talk." In 2005, the United States-based Kabbalah Center and the Palestinian Abu Assukar Center for Peace and Dialogue organized a children's camp for 115 Israeli children and 115 Palestinian children aged 8 to 12 to take place near Tel Aviv at the Ramat Gan Safari Park. The camp, which lasted for four days, involved children from Bethlehem, Ramallah, East Jerusalem, Tulkarem, Jericho, and Jenin. The Israeli children involved were mostly those who came from severe poverty and violent backgrounds. Joint-organizer Osnat Youdkevitch remarked that, "Our message is that of dignity for all human beings. It's harder for adults to fully understand, since so much has already been built up around us, but kids have the chance to grow up thinking in a healthier way. If you play, eat and sweat for four days with a group of other kids who are supposed to be the 'enemy', it will stay in your heart forever." Mifalot is an organization founded by the owners of Hapoel Tel Aviv Football Club to promote peaceful coexistence through football. In 2013, a football match was held in
Holon Holon ( he, חוֹלוֹן ) is a city on the central coastal strip of Israel, south of Tel Aviv. Holon is part of the metropolitan Gush Dan area. In it had a population of . Holon has the second-largest industrial zone in Israel, after Haifa. ...
, bringing together Palestinian and Israeli teenagers. However, Fatah activists posted threatening messages on the Internet against the Palestinian boys and girls who participated in the tournament, and Fatah leaders in Ramallah condemned their participation in such events.


See also

*
Civilian casualties in the Second Intifada The following is a partial list of civilian casualties in the Second Intifada. In the ten years from 2000-2010, of 6371 Palestinians killed by Israeli forces, at least 2996 did not participate in hostilities when killed, and 1317 were minors. Of ...
*
List of Israeli civilian casualties in the Second Intifada The following is a partial list of Israeli civilian casualties of the Second Intifada. The International Institute for Counter-Terrorism (IPICT) puts civilian deaths at 78% and Israeli combatants at 22%, between 27 September 2000 and 1 January 20 ...
* List of Palestinian civilian casualties in the Second Intifada *
Violence in the Israeli–Palestinian conflict Violence is the use of physical force so as to injure, abuse, damage, or destroy. Other definitions are also used, such as the World Health Organization's definition of violence as "the intentional use of physical force or power, threatened o ...
*
Children in emergencies and conflicts Children in emergencies and conflicts constitutes the effects of situations that pose detrimental risks to the health, safety, and well-being of children. There are many different kinds of conflicts and emergencies, for example, violence, armed con ...


References


Citations


Sources

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Children And Minors In The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict Israeli–Palestinian conflict War crimes in Israel Palestinian terrorism Children in war