2LT International News

GAZA, Palestinian territories – Three Palestinian children were targeted by an Israeli warplane on Sunday near Khan Yunis in the south-eastern portion of the Gaza Strip.

The boys, aged 12, 13, and 14 were killed in the airstrike.

The Israeli army said the three were near the border fence and looked to be placing a suspicious object there, which they believed could have been an explosive device.

Red Crescent medics however said the boy’s bodies were found 200 metres from the border fence. The Red Crescent is the local division of the Red Cross.

Ashraf al-Kidra of the Palestinian Health Ministry told The Associated Press, ambulance crews were bringing the bodies to a hospital from the perimeter fence dividing Gaza and Israel.

One Israeli news organization described the boys as a ‘terror cell.’

“After being identified approaching the security fence with a suspicious object by an observation post, the Israel Defense Forces launched an airstrike against an apparent terror cell,” a Ynet News report said without giving the ages of those targeted.

“The Israeli military said Sunday that it struck three Palestinians who were attempting to place an explosive device near the border fence in the southern Gaza Strip. Three Palestinians boys between the ages of 12 and 14 were killed in the strike, Gaza’s Health Ministry said,” the Israel-based Haaretz newspaper said.

According to Haaretz, the PLO identified the three killed as Khaled Bassam Mahmoud Abu Saeed, Abdul Hameed Mohammed Abdul Aziz Abu Zaher and Mohammed Ibrahim Abdullah al-Sutari.

Ynet News said the boys were observed by the Israeli military crawling towards the fence, which conflicts with the Red Crescent report.

“The Palestinians were spotted by a Gaza division observation post while they were crawling in the dark towards the security fence with the suspicious object,” said the Ynet report.

The New York Times Monday said there appeared to be no evidence of an explosive device in the area.

The boys lived in a village about a mile from the border and were neighbours.

“In the village where the boys lived, Wadi al-Salqa, in the southern Gaza Strip, there was talk that they might have been laying nets for hunting birds, though the security fence — a known danger zone, especially at night — is hardly an obvious place to catch wildlife,” The New York Times report said.

Aisha Abu Daher, the mother of one of the boys denied her son was a militant. She told the UAE-based Al Arabiya her 14-year-old son Abdel-Hameed had “nothing to do with resistance.”

Thousands of people turned out in farewell Monday for the boys’ funerals.

The Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) on Monday called on the International Criminal Court (ICC) to launch an investigation into the childrens’ deaths.

“The international community and its institutions must break their silence towards the incessant crimes committed by the occupation army,” the PLO said in a statement.

“The ICC is requested to launch an immediate investigation into this crime,” it added.