“I didn’t want to die,” said a crying 14-year-old boy, sent on a suicide-mission against an Israeli military position. “I wanted to go back to my family.” He appeared this week on a Channel Two television broadcast as a live example of how Palestinian terrorist groups use children for their murderous designs.

The Palestinian Authority’s television programs glorifying and encouraging suicide killings by children have been part and parcel of a growing phenomenon of terrorist exploitation of children under the umbrella of the PLO. The IDF Spokesman’s Office reports that there has been a marked increase in such exploitation by the terrorist groups, and the number of attacks carried out or attempted by Arab minors has risen accordingly. The children are selected for their innocent appearance and youth, thought to deter IDF soldiers from decisive action against them.

For example, Hitham Assad, 14, of Sheikh Redwan in Gaza, was shot and killed by IDF soldiers in the Dugit area as he and a comrade attempted to infiltrate the Katif bloc of Jewish towns. Soldiers found two pipe bombs, a knife and a map of the Jewish towns in the area on the body of the boy. Another example is a 14-year-old Bethlehem girl, Shirin Rabia, who confirmed to IDF investigators that she had planned to commit a suicide attack at the behest of her own uncle, Tanzim leader Yihye Da\'amse. Not only had he encouraged the suicide of his own niece, but he asked her to recruit other girls from among her classmates.

The PA does nothing to prevent this child exploitation, the IDF spokesman says, and actually uses its media to promote the glory of suicide operations. The Arab children, cannon fodder in the hands of their PA elders, have been largely ignored by international children’s rights groups, despite the severe violations of the International Convention on the Protection of Children.