Despite the commitment of the Palestinian resistance groups to the truce agreed between Palestinians and Israelis at the summit in Sharm al-Sheik in February, Israeli occupation forces have escalated their aggression against civilians in the Occupied Palestinian Territories. This was crowned by the killing on Saturday 9 April of three children to the south of Rafah camp near the border separating Egypt from the Palestinian territories.

At around 4pm that day, Israeli forces on the Egyptian border opened fire without warning on a group of children who were playing in the area. These children did not constitute any danger to the Israeli soldiers.

As a result of the Israeli attack, three boys were killed:
Hassan Ahmad Khalil Abu Zeid – 16 years old
Khaled Fouad Shaker Ghanam – 16 years old
Ashraf Samir Ahmad Mousa – 15 years old

All three were fatally shot in the upper body or head, clearly indicating that the Israeli soldiers were operating on a shoot-to-kill policy.

The death of the three boys brings to 27 the number of children killed since the start of this year. A further 676 children were killed by Israeli troops and settlers between the start of this intifada and the end of 2004.

Defence for Children International/ Palestine Section strongly condemns this tragic incident and the continuous Israeli violations of the rights of Palestinian children as enshrined in the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), to which Israel is a state party.

We call upon the international community to take immediate action to end such Israeli crimes, and to set in place measures to bring the perpetrators to international courts. The international community has a responsibility to uphold and protect the rights of children and enforce these standards when states transgress. It is imperative that the world acts today to force Israel to abide by its explicit responsibilities to all children in the Occupied Territories as set down in the CRC and consequently, cease immediately the deliberate violation of their rights.

We also urge the high contracting parties to the Fourth Geneva Convention to bear their legal responsibilities to respect and ensure respect of the convention in all circumstances and ensure the protection of Palestinian civilians in general, and Palestinian children in particular.