2021 is deadliest year for Palestinian children living under Israeli occupation since 2014, DCIP says

Occupied Palestine (QNN)- ‘Israel’ killed 86 Palestinian children in the Occupied Palestinian Territory since January, making 2021 the deadliest year on record for Palestinian children since 2014, Defense for Children International – Palestine said.

In a newly-published report, DCIP found that Israeli forces killed 76 Palestinian children, including 61 Palestinian children in the Gaza Strip and 15 Palestinian children in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem.

Armed Israeli settlers killed two Palestinian children in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem.

Most recently, 15-year-old Mohammad Nidal Younis Mousa succumbed to his wounds on December 6, hours after a private Israeli security guard shot him after he had allegedly committed a car-ramming attack at an Israeli military checkpoint near Tulkarm, according to information collected by DCIP.

One Palestinian child was killed by an unexploded ordinance, the origins of which could not be determined, according to documentation gathered by DCIP.

Obaida Salahuddin Salman al-Dahdouh, 8, was killed when an unexploded ordnance (UXO) that he had found on agricultural land adjacent to his home in Gaza City’s Zeitoun neighborhood detonated, on June 9, DCIP said.

Israeli forces have shot and killed 17 Palestinian children with live ammunition this year, 15 in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and two in the Gaza Strip.

At least nine Palestinian children were shot and killed in the context of demonstrations or confrontations with Israeli forces and did not present a direct threat to life or of serious injury when they were shot, according to investigations conducted by DCIP.

DCIP said under international law, intentional lethal force is only justified in circumstances where a direct threat to life or of serious injury is present. However, investigations and evidence collected by it regularly suggest that Israeli forces use lethal force against Palestinian children in circumstances that may amount to extrajudicial or wilful killings.

Israeli forces killed 60 Palestinian children during Israel’s aggression on the Gaza Strip in May 2021, dubbed Operation Guardian of the Walls, according to documentation collected by DCIP.

During the 11-day aggression, Israeli forces killed Palestinian children using tank-fired shells, live ammunition, and missiles dropped from weaponized drones and U.S.-sourced warplanes and Apache helicopters.

Six children were killed on May 10, the first day of aggression, in Beit Hanoun in the northern Gaza Strip by an Israeli airstrike, according to DCIP’s investigation. And ten children were injured in the same airstrike.

“Israeli warplanes and weaponized drones bombarded densely populated civilian areas killing Palestinian children sleeping in their beds, playing in their neighborhoods, shopping at stores near their homes, and celebrating Eid Al-Fitr with their families,” said Ayed Abu Eqtaish, accountability program director at DCIP.

“The international community’s lack of political will to hold Israeli officials accountable guarantees that Israeli soldiers will continue to unlawfully kill Palestinian children with impunity.”

The most recent spike in child killings occurred in 2018 when Israeli forces and settlers ​killed Palestinian children at an average pace exceeding one child per week. That year, 57 Palestinian children were killed by Israeli forces and settlers, DCIP noted. The majority of those killings occurred during the March of Return protests in the Gaza Strip.

Since 2000, DCIP documented that 2,198 Palestinian children have been killed as a result of Israeli military and settler presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory.