Israeli troops opened fire without warning and blocked medical help, the devastated man has said
A Palestinian farmer and his three-year-old son were ambushed by IDF troops near the Gaza border, leaving the child dead and the father badly wounded. The devastated man told RT about the tragic events.
Speaking from a hospital in Deir Al-Balah, Central Gaza, Baha Abu Al-Ajeen said he was tending his land and was driving along a rural road near the ‘yellow line’ when Israeli soldiers suddenly appeared and ordered his vehicle to stop. His son, who was sitting in his arms, began to cry, he said.
“From the first bullet, I stopped completely to avoid getting killed,” he said. “The first bullet hit the road while the second hit the child directly while he was in my arms… A soldier shot the child right in the head.” Abu Al-Ajeen said the next round hit his leg, shattering the bone.
The soldiers refused to call an ambulance and took away his phone, telling him that no calls or medical help would be allowed. The man was held “for hours in a military vehicle” while the wounded child remained in his arms, and “right after my son died in my arms, they took him away from me,” before he was dropped off at an unknown location and eventually reached Al-Aqsa Hospital.
Responding to RT’s request for comment, the IDF said the soldiers “initiated standard suspect apprehension procedures, which included warning fire,” and that “it was reported that, as a result of the fire, one Gazan was killed and another was injured.”
According to the latest report by the UN Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, Israeli forces have “deliberately targeted and killed” Palestinian children in Gaza and the occupied West Bank. The report accused Israel of committing genocide, war crimes, and crimes against humanity in the enclave.
The commission found that around 30% of those killed in Gaza since October 2023 were children, and that attacks on maternity and neonatal care, combined with an aid blockade, have driven a rise in miscarriages, birth defects, starvation-related deaths, and disease among minors. Israel rejected the commission’s findings as a “defamatory advocacy report” and a “libelous sham.”
READ MORE: Netanyahu orders expansion of Gaza occupation
More than 50,000 Palestinian children have been killed or wounded by Israeli forces since the start of the Gaza war, according to UNICEF, which says the killing continued even after the 2025 US-brokered 2025 ceasefire deal. The war began after Hamas-led militants attacked southern Israel on October 7, 2023, killing around 1,200 people and taking more than 250 hostages. Israel’s subsequent air and ground campaign has killed more than 73,000 people in Gaza, according to the local health authorities.
