All of Hamas’ leaders, the politicians such as Ismail Haniyeh and the military such as Mohammed Deif, are probably hiding in a bunker under the Shifa hospital, the largest medical facility in Gaza, as they did during the last operation in Gaza in 2012.
Once again, the Islamists are deploying all their humanitarian arsenal against Israel and using their own children as human shields.
In Shuja’iya, the Muslim terrorists launch rockets, Iranian grad-type missiles, from the mosque of Abu Ayn, from the Wafa hospital and from a kindergarten. But UNICEF, the UN agency devoted to the rights and lives of children, has never raised its voice against the Palestinian leadership.
Does UNICEF believe that it is acceptable to teach Arab children to blow themselves up against Jews, pay them to run guns, or to throw stones at soldiers at the risk of their lives?
The philosophy behind the use of women, children and civilians has been explained clearly by Hamas’ former minister Fathi Hammad: “It is like saying to the Zionist enemy: ‘We desire death as you desire life’”.
A television spot from Hamas’ channel says: “Bombs are more precious than children”. Translation: you are a potential shaheed, martyr, so don’t abandon your homes despite Israeli warnings, but protect the bodies of the mujahideen with your own. The holy war is worth more than your life.
The tactic dates back to the withdrawal of Israel from Gaza. On 20 November 2006, the Israeli army ordered the evacuation of the house of terrorist leader Waal Rajeb to Shaqra. Hamas responded by forming a ring of women and children around the building.
When that occurred, there was only silence from UNICEF.
The UN agency also sees no problem in Hamas’ uses of UN schools to store weapons and rockets.
Jewish children learn math by counting how many of them are still at their desks.
But in the last few days, UNICEF has been very busy denouncing the “Israeli massacres of Palestinian children”. Western and Arab Newspapers and televisions are all dribbling for UNICEF’s numbers. It is a blood libel against the Israeli army because it gives the impression that Jews target Arab children.
Meanwhile, nobody at UNICEF is touched by the Israeli children, who have to go to schools protected by armed guards and who have to travel on buses fearing for their lives.
Where was UNICEF when Jewish children were murdered in their mothers’ arms?
Where was UNICEF when the Fogel children were slaughtered in their own beds?
Where was UNICEF when Jewish children had their faces burned or their hands rendered useless, some with their sight ruined forever?
Between 2000 and 2004, 128 Jewish children were killed, 9 of them less than a year old; 9 pregnant women were murdered; 886 children lost one parent and 31 lost both. The youngest victim of terror was just one day old.
UNICEF was silent about them. Are Palestinian Arab children more “innocent” than Jewish ones?
Sderot’s children—five thousand in the local area—live as prisoners in their own homes, unable to play outside, swim in a pool, ride a bike, or kick a football. In the Israeli elementary schools, Jewish children learn math by counting how many of them are still at their desks.
Jewish children in the south don’t eat well, have nightmares, don’t go outside alone, don’t want their mothers to go to work, don’t play, have lots of problems at school. Many of these children were born under Hamas fire. They have never known anything different.
80 percent of the children in the Negev show symptoms of trauma. Thousands of children also have physical disabilities from Palestinian bombs. There are children who don’t get out of bed anymore.
Where are all the organizations devoted to the rights of the children? Do they also believe, like Hamas and the Islamic Jihad, that Jewish children are a legitimate target? Do they believe that Jewish students deserve the fate they met in Maalot?
People around the world should protest against this shameful discimination. Because silence is telling. The world has always been deaf and blind to the subject of Jewish children's suffering.