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The ongoing Israeli war on the Gaza Strip has left horrific stories against civilians, especially children who were deprived of their innocence by the Israeli bombing, who found themselves in the midst of killing without any fault of their own.

Among those stories stuck in the minds of the world is the child Hind Rajab, who had not yet completed her sixth birthday and found herself surrounded by death from all sides, but the demand for accountability for the crime of her execution is still awaiting an answer.

Hind begged Red Crescent officials to rescue her from the car she was in with her relatives, all of whom were killed by Israeli army bullets, but ambulance crews were unable to reach her due to the intensity of the fire and the army’s targeting of everything that moved.

The child waited and remained for 3 hours telling the Red Crescent crews over the phone that she was afraid among the bodies of her relatives in the car who had been executed by the Israeli army.

On Saturday, days after this last call, ambulance teams found Hind’s body. She had been dead since the day she called for help, as well as the bodies of the two paramedics who came out to save her.

How many should be killed?

Commenting on the killing of the child Hind, the Executive Director of the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), Catherine Russell, asked on Sunday, denouncing: “How many children will die before this nightmare in the Gaza Strip ends?!”

Russell added on the X platform: “Heartbreaking news that the body of the little girl was found with her relatives and rescue workers who tried to return her safely to her mother.”

Heartbreaking news that the body of a little girl named Hind was finally found in Gaza today along with relatives & rescue workers who tried to bring her safely back to her mother.

How many more children will suffer and die before this nightmare ends?

— Catherine Russell (@unicefchief) February 10, 2024

Despite the horror of the crime, Israel has not yet been subjected to any accountability after its killing of the Palestinian girl, while the American administration is content with saying that it is awaiting an investigation from Tel Aviv on the matter.

On January 29, Israeli forces bombed a car that was driving on the road searching for shelter in the city, where there was no safe place left due to the Israeli bombing.

On Saturday, Palestinian Red Crescent Society spokeswoman Nibal Farsakh told Anadolu Agency: “Sources from the family informed us that they found the child Hind killed inside a vehicle, and in it were 6 bodies of her family members, including the child Layan, while some of the bodies were decomposing,” and that after 12 days had passed. On losing her.

In a statement, the association announced that its ambulance, “which went out to rescue the child Hind 12 days ago, was found bombed in the Tal al-Hawa area (west) with the crew inside martyred.”

She continued: "The Palestinian Red Crescent ambulance was found bombed in the Tal Al-Hawa area, and the crew, Youssef Zaino and Ahmed Al-Madhoun, were martyred, after their traces were lost during the mission to rescue the child Hind 12 days ago."

She explained that the Israeli army "deliberately targeted the ambulance upon its arrival at the site, as the ambulance was found meters away from the vehicle containing the child Hind."

On January 29, the Red Crescent ambulance crew went out to rescue the two girls, Layan (15 years old) and Hind, after they were surrounded by Israeli army tanks and soldiers, inside a vehicle in which they were with their family members near the “Fares” gas station west of Gaza City, according to a statement issued by the association. at that time.

A day later, the association announced the killing of the child Layan, while she was “talking on the phone with the Crescent’s crew, calling for help, while Hind remained trapped inside the vehicle surrounded by occupation tanks and soldiers.”

Wissam Rajab, Hind's mother, did not expect that her little girl would not find anyone to save her or bury her even after her death, according to what she told Al Jazeera.

She added - while carrying some of her late daughter's belongings - that she could not imagine how a child could see the scenes of corpses around her inside the car.

The martyr’s mother confirmed that she did not know how she would return home without her child, who, as she put it, dreamed of nothing more than returning home with her father and brother to eat pizza.

She described her last moments with her daughter, saying that she styled her hair and told her that she was the most beautiful she could be on the day she was martyred.

A shy American role

On Monday, a US State Department spokesman told Anadolu Agency, requesting anonymity: “We were shocked by the reports of Hind Rajab’s death.”

He added: "A very large number of civilians were killed in this conflict, and we consider every civilian death in the context of this conflict to be a tragedy, but the death of a child is particularly heartbreaking."

He called on Israel to "take all possible precautions to prevent harm to civilians, protect humanitarian workers, and investigate credible allegations of violations of the law of war and human rights violations."

The American official claimed that his country "asked the Israeli authorities to investigate this incident urgently," and concluded his speech by saying: "We understand that the Israeli government is doing this, and we expect to see the results as soon as they are ready."

On Tuesday, an Anadolu Agency correspondent asked US State Department spokesman Matthew Miller about reports indicating the presence of an American-made weapon in the targeted ambulance.

Miller said in response to the question: “We were shocked by the news of Hind Rajab’s death, and we asked Israel to investigate the incident immediately,” noting that he could not confirm the presence of American-made weapons.

As for Israel, which bombed hospitals and ambulances hundreds of times in Gaza, it did not provide any explanation or issue a statement about the attack.

After the American call for an investigation, the Israeli army announced that it had begun a preliminary investigation and that it could not provide additional information.

During the past few days, the Israeli army re-entered several areas of the Gaza Governorate, coinciding with the implementation of military operations and intense air and artillery bombardment, and requested the evacuation of residents from several residential neighborhoods.

Israel is being tried before the International Court of Justice for committing “genocide” crimes against the Palestinians in its devastating war on Gaza since October 7, which as of Wednesday left 28,576 martyrs and 68,291 injured, most of them children and women, in addition to thousands of missing persons. Under the rubble, according to the Palestinian authorities.

Source: Al Jazeera + Anatolia