For many years, the armed Palestinian factions have been in the business of forcing others to “sacrifice for the cause.” In the Gaza Strip, for example, Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine have for many years been hiding their weapons in and near civilian structures – schools, hospitals, office buildings, apartments – so as to ensure that civilians will also be put at risk if, and when, Israel attacks those weapons hideouts. Of course, Israel does everything it can to warn civilians away from buildings about to be targeted, by emailing, telephoning, and making use of the “knock-on-the-roof” technique. Still, there will always be those who do not leave in time, and despite Israel’s best efforts, there are Palestinian civilians who are wounded and killed.
Another practice of the Palestinians is to recruit minors, filing them with dreams of becoming “shahids” or “martyrs” for the cause of Palestine. More and more parents of such children have been expressing their alarm over this practice; they don’t want their teenage sons to become cannon fodder. More on this can be found here: “Nablus residents worried about minors joining clashes with IDF,” by Khaled Abu Toameh, Jerusalem Post, December 17, 2022
Some Palestinians in Nablus have expressed concern over the recruitment of minors by armed groups in the city and the nearby Balata Refugee Camp.
Some of the minors have been tasked by the groups, the Lions’ Den and Balata Battalion, with preparing explosive devices that are being used against the soldiers, Palestinian sources said. Others have been armed with rifles.
Preparing explosives for others to use against IDF soldiers is itself a very dangerous task. So is arming these minors with rifles, which will make them even more ready and willing to participate in battles, to fight and die for Palestine. And it also makes them, carrying their rifles, more likely targets of IDF snipers.
The recruitment of minors by Palestinian armed groups is not a new phenomenon. In fact, the practice has existed for decades.
But in recent weeks some residents of Nablus criticized the armed groups for allowing boys aged 15-17 to take part in the clashes with the IDF. The residents also attacked the groups for using the boys to prepare explosive devices and monitor the movements of IDF troops….
A school headmaster from the city said he received complaints from many parents about the “exploitation” of their children by the armed groups. “We are working closely with the families and the Palestinian security services to solve this problem,” he said. “We don’t want to endanger the lives of our children.”
The only “solution” to this problem of child endangerment is for the parents collectively to exert enough pressure on the terror groups so that they stop this shameless practice of persuading young people to fight and die for the “cause of Palestine.”
A 15-year-old boy, who identified himself as Nasser, told The Jerusalem Post that he “works for” the Balata Battalion, which consists of dozens of gunmen from the refugee camp.
Interviewed in the Old City of Nablus last week, Nasser said he and one of his friends, Mohammed, 16, were involved in preparing improvised explosive devices for the group….
Having these children – Nasser, 15, and Mohammed, 16 — risking their lives by trying to put together “improvised explosive devices” is shameful. How many adults, much less children, have died doing that very thing? This constitutes child endangerment.
“My role model is Ibrahim al-Nabulsi,” Nasser said, referring to the Nablus gunman killed by the IDF in the Old City of Nablus last August. “I want to be a martyr like Ibrahim.”…
“I told my father, ‘You love me and want me to be with you, but God also loves me and wants me to be with Him. I have chosen to be with God.’”
I’m sure that Nasser’s father’s heart sank as he heard his 15-year-old son declare that he is ready to be a “shahid” in order to be not with his father here below, but with “God” who “wants me to be with Him.” He’s been thoroughly brainwashed. There is little the father can do except to take out his fury on those in the terror groups who have led his son to this fateful decision, holding up for emulation the example of the late Ibrahim al-Nabulsi.
Nasser said he and his friends have lost confidence in the Palestinian Authority. “Our leader is [Hamas military commander] Mohammed Deif,” he added. “He represents us and the Palestinian resistance.”
Yes, despite its many faults, the Palestinian Authority does not – unlike Hamas and the other terror groups – try to recruit for its military wing, Fatah, child soldiers, underage “shahids” And the PA has intermittently cooperated with Israeli security on foiling the plans of their common enemies, Hamas and the PIJ, in the West Bank, which is no doubt why Nasser and his friends have “lost confidence” in the PA.
Although he lives in Balata Refugee Camp, Nasser visits the site where al-Nabulsi was killed in the Old City of Nablus almost every day. When he returns to Balata camp, he added, he joins other teenagers in preparing explosive devices.
What a doomed life Nasser has made for himself. He quit school at 15. Instead of studying, he pays homage to the late Ibrahim al-Nabulsi by visiting almost every day the site where the “martyr” was killed. Nasser now has no future, except that of emulating al-Nabulsi’s life and, almost certainly, his death. He spends his days preparing explosives — a most dangerous undertaking — working alongside other Palestinian teenagers who dream of murdering Israelis and, if necessary, giving their own lives “for Palestine.”
Last month, Mahdi Hashash, 15, was killed when an explosive device he was carrying exploded.
The incident took place during clashes between gunmen and IDF soldiers accompanying Jewish worshippers to Joseph’s Tomb near Balata camp.
Another 15-year-old, Mahdi Hashash, accidentally blew himself up while carrying an explosive device, perhaps the very one he had earlier fabricated, albeit faultily, himself. It’s what the Israelis mordantly call “a work accident.” No doubt Mahdi would have wished to fling it at some IDF soldiers but before he could, the ill-constructed explosive had other ideas, and blew him to smithereens. Or perhaps it was not the device that was faulty, but Mahdi Hashash’s teenage carelessness. Was it in the form of a grenade, and after pulling the pin, did Hashash wait too long to throw it so that it blew up in his hand? The Balata Battalion is not saying.
The Balata Battalion later endorsed Hashash as one of its “martyrs.” The group, however, did not publicly admit that Hashash, nicknamed Shaimoun, was carrying an explosive device.
Hashash’s friends told the Post that, like many teenagers, one of his missions was also to monitor the movements of the IDF when they enter Nablus.
After his death, the Balata Battalion praised Hashash as a “hero” and described him as a “Lion of the Battalion.”
Such praise for Mahdi Hashash makes other impressionable Palestinian teenagers want to emulate his life and, especially, his “heroic” death.
Last August, 18-year-old Waseem Khalifeh, also of Balata Refugee Camp, was killed by the IDF while fighting alongside Balata Battalion gunmen. A year earlier, Khalifeh was shot and seriously injured by the IDF during armed clashes in the camp.
Sources in the camp confirmed that Khalifeh had joined the Balata Battalion at the age of 16.
Waseem Khalifeh had first seen fighting when he was all of 17 years old. He stuck with it, despite having been wounded the year before, so brainwashed by his elders in the Balata Battalion to believe that the life of a “shahid” was his highest calling. And hardly having lived, still a minor, Waseem Khalifeh died.
Another teenager, Ahmed Shehadeh, 16, was killed during armed clashes with the IDF in Nablus in late November.
Shehadeh, a resident of the Old City, was a close friend of Hashash. Days before he was killed, Shehadeh posted a video of himself standing next to the grave of Hashash.
The Balata Battalion described Shehadeh as the “boy of rocks,” a reference to his involvement in throwing rocks at IDF soldiers. Some residents claimed Shehadeh had been recruited by the Lions’ Den….
Like all these teenager fighters who wanted to be martyrs, Shehadeh had been thoroughly brainwashed to “fight in the way of Allah.” He found inspiration in the “”martyrdom” of his friend Hashash; he posted a video of himself standing.beside the grave of his friend a few days before he himelf was killed fighting IDF soldiers in Nablus.
Thesterror groups in the West Bank have been actively recruiting teenagers. This practice bespeaks a cruel indifference to the lives of those Palestinians who, while still in their mid- to late teens, are inveigled into joining these groups so that they can serve as cannon fodder, either by preparing explosives, a dangerous task, or by fighting, before they have reached adulthood. And while some Palestinian parents, particularly mothers, claim to be pleased that their children chose “martyrdom,” and hoped that their other sons would go and do likewise, most Palestinian parents are in a frenzy of despair that their children, too, might follow the same pitiful path as Nasser, Waseem Khalifeh, Ahmed Shehadeh, and Mahdi Hashash.
࿗Infidel࿘ says
I thought that the Palis love death even more than we love life. What’s this I’m reading about Pali parents balking at being celebrated as parents of shaheeds (I’ll avoid using the term ‘martyr’ here, as it bastardizes the meaning. Shaheed is as different from martyr as allah is from God)
mg says
But they can’t be fed up and express what it being done to their children as it would bring them their own death Jihadists follow only mo’s dictates and regard anything moderating those as blasphemy. That should be explored. The ability to disagree with the Jihadists brings suffering to those who attempt. And they likewise are too blame because they can’t escape the confines and refuse to do so even when moving to non Muslim lands. We virtually never hear the roaring criticism of these commanders of homicidism even in non Muslim lands.
Walter Sieruk says
This “recruitment” by adult jihadist Muslims to engage in suicide/homicide jihad attacks is completely unconscionable and totally indefensible affront by any valid definition of what is decent, good righteous and right.
That jihadist manipulation of impressionable children is outright child abuse and a despicable exploitation of children too the most horrendous evil possible . Those wicked adult jihadist are so very heinous that they knowingly and willfully are recruiting children to death.
As explained before but well worth reiterating ,which is the there some good but naive Westerners who when discovering about that recruiting of children to become murderous jihad bombers. Those same Westerners would be shocked and then stop and wonder and ask “Just how can the jihad-minded Muslims adults be so horrible ,since they are so very religions as to want to take deadly advantage of children use them as tools and stooges in the jihad ?”
The answer to that question is found in the Bible, which informs its reader that there are some men who are very callous ,heartless and unfeeling because they have had “their conscience seared with a hot iron.” First Timothy 4:2. [K.J.V.]
In this specific situation that “hot iron” is Islam.
Walter Sieruk says
In an Islamic propaganda booklet designed to proselytize Westerner to Islam it had in it the bogus claim that “Islam is a religion that respects life…”
As seen in this article as well as from many other sources that claim in not only false but it’s also 100% Balderdash..
Deodata says
Maybe it’s time for Palestinian women to unite and challenge the men, only they will stop their children being sacrificed.
࿗Infidel࿘ says
Except that they are as fanatical, if not more, than their husbands. Look at Rashida Tlaib: her family is pro-Hamas, while her ex-husband was pro-Fatah
James Lincoln says
So what is causing Palestinian mothers to be alarmed NOW???
Using “Palestinian” minor children as martyrs is nothing new…